{"id":39152,"date":"2023-01-02T03:07:43","date_gmt":"2023-01-02T03:07:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.brandon.ddtest.info\/multisite-test\/donations-help-man-living-on-norwalk-streets-stay-in-hotel\/"},"modified":"2023-01-02T03:07:43","modified_gmt":"2023-01-02T03:07:43","slug":"donations-help-man-living-on-norwalk-streets-stay-in-hotel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.brandon.ddtest.info\/multisite-test\/donations-help-man-living-on-norwalk-streets-stay-in-hotel\/","title":{"rendered":"Donations help man living on Norwalk streets stay in hotel"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> \n<\/p>\n<p>NORWALK \u2014 Pushing a cart full of bottles and cans, Paris Stricklin never asked anyone for money. He became a staple on Connecticut Avenue, and people started bringing him their cans and bottles. On a particularly blustery cold day shortly before Christmas, Amy Stackhouse, a nanny from Norwalk, decided she needed to do more for Stricklin after bringing him cans.<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0\u201cI just remember driving home thinking, \u2018I&#8217;m going to make a fire. I just want to get inside,\u2019\u201d Stackhouse said. \u201cI walked into my house, and I just started crying, thinking about Paris, even homeless people in general that don&#8217;t have the luxury of getting out of the cold.<\/p>\n<div id=\"paywall\">\n<p>&#8220;I wanted to put something together for him in particular, and I thought, a warm sleeping bag for sleeping outside and maybe a couple of other items \u2014 a gift card to the supermarket where he can just get quick meals.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>        <!-- hearst\/article\/content\/embed.tpl --><\/p>\n<section class=\"article--content-embed inline-iframe\" data-eid=\"item-96898\">\n<\/section>\n<p><!-- e hearst\/article\/content\/embed.tpl -->            <\/p>\n<p>She started with a Facebook post, and beyond her expectations, the community rallied to help Stricklin. Total strangers donated items and sent money to Stackhouse through Venmo, a mobile payment app, which she used to buy a new sleeping bag and other items for Stricklin. The remaining money covered a $100 ShopRite gift card.<\/p>\n<p>        <!-- hearst\/article\/content\/relatedStories.tpl --><\/p>\n<section class=\"relatedStories\" data-progressive=\"true\"\/>\n     <!-- e hearst\/article\/content\/relatedStories.tpl -->            <\/p>\n<p>After Stackhouse posted a photo of everything the community had purchased and thanked everyone, she delivered the bag to Stricklin, who said he felt \u201coverpowered\u201d by the gift.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt started off as simple as just anyone who has a heart doesn&#8217;t want to see anybody freezing cold, doesn&#8217;t want to see anybody starving and without a home,\u201d Stackhouse said. \u201cThis man in particular, I think he&#8217;s just a very familiar face in the area.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Stricklin lost his job and left Columbus, Ga., to go to Manhattan in 2017. He has been homeless and living on the East Coast since then. Stricklin said that he has lived in every borough of New York City, and in 2018, he took a train from Manhattan to Connecticut with intentions of returning to New York.<\/p>\n<p>However, he was unable to board a train to Manhattan and has stayed in Connecticut since. Stricklin explained that he made the deliberate choice to not ask people for money because he didn\u2019t want strangers to yell things like \u201cget a job\u201d or \u201cstop bumming\u201d at him, and he also wanted to be able to say that he never asked people for anything.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The supplies were just the beginning of the community\u2019s generosity, however. A neighbor in the community, Victoria Hines, commented on the post with a new idea to help Stricklin. Hines then created her own post dedicated to finding a way to give Stricklin a hotel stay for Christmas.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cFrom there, it just really, really blew up,\u201d Stackhouse said. \u201cThe money just started pouring in, and people were sharing the posts. Then I put it on my personal page because at that point now we had gotten him enough money for seven nights at the Extended Stay America. \u2026 Basically, this is my last attempt to get enough money to get one more night so we could check him in Friday night because the temperature was supposed to drop so severely. And then on my page, another big outpour of generosity.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Between the hotel and donations to the original post, Stackhouse said the total raised for Stricklin is over $4,700. Donations are still being accepted on Venmo at @LetsHelpParis. He is staying in the hotel now, and Stricklin said he sees the hotel as his home because he has never had his own home.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI never had my own place,\u201d Stricklin said. \u201cNever had my own vehicle. \u2026 Now, fortunately, I have my own things. I&#8217;ve never had it.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<aside class=\"article--content-inline\">\n<aside class=\"zone\">\n<p><!-- hearst\/home\/mostPopular.tpl --><\/p>\n<p><!--e hearst\/home\/mostPopular.tpl --><!-- src\/business\/widgets\/hearst\/collection\/widget.tpl --><\/p>\n<p>    <!-- e src\/business\/widgets\/hearst\/collection\/widget.tpl --><!-- src\/business\/widgets\/hearst\/collection\/widget.tpl --><\/p>\n<p><!-- noGen: collection_92a2b5cb9c6906035c2864fa225e1940_101822_ssl --><br \/>\n<!-- e src\/business\/widgets\/hearst\/collection\/widget.tpl --><\/aside>\n<\/aside>\n<p>Permanent housing is a strong possibility in the near future. From the Facebook posts, a couple people who work in low-income housing have reached out to Stackhouse and Hines and are able to help navigate the paperwork Stricklin needs.<\/p>\n<p>Because he is still doesn&#8217;t have permanent housing, physical donations, according to Stackhouse, are tricky since he needs to be mobile. Instead, donations through Venmo or directly to Stricklin are more helpful as they can then be directed toward what Stricklin needs in the next step of his journey.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt&#8217;s so helpful,\u201d Stricklin said. \u201cAcknowledging my condition and everything being a homeless person all these years. I\u2019m so highly grateful. I\u2019m highly grateful for everyone\u2019s support, the cans, bottles, their funds. People need their funds. And I ain\u2019t never asked nobody for no money\u2026 All I want to do is hold two bottles in my hands and clench them.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Stackhouse hopes that Stricklin\u2019s story and the generosity of the community can help change the way people look at people experiencing homelessness.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI want people to see that these aren&#8217;t just like these homeless entities. These are human beings, and they all have a story. There&#8217;s somebody&#8217;s son, there&#8217;s somebody&#8217;s brother.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n<section id=\"articleBottom\" class=\"article--content-zone bottom\"\/><\/div>\n\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/news.google.com\/__i\/rss\/rd\/articles\/CBMiUmh0dHBzOi8vd3d3LnRoZWhvdXIuY29tL25ld3MvYXJ0aWNsZS9Ob3J3YWxrLWhvbWVsZXNzLWRvbmF0aW9ucy1ob3RlbC0xNzY4MzYzMS5waHDSAQA?oc=5\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>NORWALK \u2014 Pushing a cart full of bottles and cans, Paris Stricklin never asked anyone for money. He became a staple on Connecticut Avenue, and people started bringing him their cans and bottles. On a particularly blustery cold day shortly before Christmas, Amy Stackhouse, a nanny from Norwalk, decided she needed to do more for &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":39153,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[161],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.brandon.ddtest.info\/multisite-test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39152"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.brandon.ddtest.info\/multisite-test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.brandon.ddtest.info\/multisite-test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.brandon.ddtest.info\/multisite-test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.brandon.ddtest.info\/multisite-test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39152"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.brandon.ddtest.info\/multisite-test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39152\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.brandon.ddtest.info\/multisite-test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/39153"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.brandon.ddtest.info\/multisite-test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39152"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.brandon.ddtest.info\/multisite-test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39152"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.brandon.ddtest.info\/multisite-test\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39152"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}