MICHEL MARTIN, HOST:
Of course, being unemployed long-term is a serious challenge, but paying for housing can be a challenge even for people who work, especially in rural areas where the availability can range from limited to nonexistent. Yesterday, we visited the small town of Flagstaff, Ariz., and we met a woman who turned an old 66 Motel into transitional housing. Today, reporters Mark Neumann and Laurel Morales of member station KJZZ take us inside.
LAUREL MORALES, BYLINE: When former financial planner Lori Barlow moved to Flagstaff, she volunteered at the emergency shelter.
MARK NEUMANN, BYLINE: She was overwhelmed by the number of people stuck in poverty.
LORI BARLOW: I was surprised we had people staying there that had jobs. And that just amazed me. You know, what's happening to these people that are trying?
NEUMANN: Barlow now houses about 50 of those people at the old 66 Motel, now called A New Living Community. Many work seasonal jobs or rely on Social Security or disability checks to pay the rent.
MORALES: People like Hans Pap, who moved here from Baltimore after he'd been diagnosed with lung cancer.
HANS PAP: It was one of my dreams to come out West, so I figured before I die I'd at least come out here and see the West.
NEUMANN: Being homeless in Flagstaff was harder than Pap expected. He says there were few places to go to escape the cold.
MORALES: Things are a little better now that he has a key to a room at A New Living Community.
PAP: That's a propane camping stove that I use to cook with, usually hamburger, chicken, cheap stuff. I usually crack that window open a little bit to kind of get some air circulating.
WILLIAM FULTON: Hey, buddy.
UNIDENTIFIED MAN: How's it going? When you get a chance, I was going to talk to you about my heater.
NEUMANN: A few doors down, William Fulton is working on the old motel rooms.
MORALES: He's a former engineer with more than three decades of experience. But then he was injured on the job.
FULTON: Just kind of fell into a kind of state of depression and not been able to get steady work.
NEUMANN: At 58, Fulton says many think he's too old.
FULTON: Right after the housing bust, you know, the economy went down. Everybody's just trying to survive, you know? And so I got into the handyman service, and I didn't really like the title handyman because I'm an engineer. You know, I've done so much.
MORALES: Out of work and living in a van, Fulton met Lori Barlow, the woman who founded A New Living Community.
FULTON: So she asked, do you want to come in here and fix these rooms up in exchange for rent to help you back on your feet? I said yeah. (Laughter) So yeah. Sorry, I'm getting choked up.
JULIE BOWMAN: And I broke my back, smashed my face. I flew off a bike at, like, 80 miles an hour, face-first 100 feet. It was really cool.
MORALES: Julie Bowman, whose friends call her Red, crashed a motorcycle 20 years ago. Red's a self-described biker chick who used to be a bartender.
NEUMANN: The accident left her broke, partially deaf and no longer able to lift cases of beer.
MORALES: Now she takes community college courses online.
NEUMANN: Red says everybody at the motel looks after each other.
BOWMAN: That older lady, I - she told me here a couple of days ago that she's usually broke at the end of the month and doesn't have much food. She told me that and I about came unglued. And I've taken her to dinner every single night since she told me that.
MORALES: Red says she was raised that way.
NEUMANN: And she's got a lot of grit.
BOWMAN: All I've ever wanted is a house of my own and not to worry about whether I'm going to pay my electric bill. I see myself not giving up until I get it.
MORALES: That kind of determination is the spirit that drew people to Route 66.
NEUMANN: A lot of people still move along the old mother road and wind up in small towns.
MORALES: Where you can find people may have lost hope before they found each other. For NPR News, I'm Laurel Morales.
NEUMANN: And I'm Mark Neumann in Flagstaff.