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1. On a recent night, the following people fell asleep in their cars in a fancy ski town: Two ski instructors, two snow plow drivers, a ski lift operator, an ice fishing guide, an employee of a ski shop who fits people for their boots, as well as two ER nurses who treat the…
2. Alongside @erinschaff, I visited what one city council member described as the lowest form of affordable housing: A parking lot in Colorado's ski country where working people who cannot afford rent can apply to park - living out of cars covered in snow (Photos by @erinschaff)
@erinschaff 3. The housing crisis has become so acute in America that parking lots like the one we visited in Frisco, Colo., have been set aside to provide "housing" for people who cannot afford rent but can still afford a car:
4. The twist in the lot that we visited in Colorado is that homeless people applying to park here need to show a local pay stub. Put another way, for the right to live out of cars in the subzero weather, those hoping to park here need to prove they are productive members of the local economy:
5. Among the people that we shadowed is Kristine Litchfield who earns $24 an hour fitting people for ski boots. That's significantly more than Colorado's minimum wage of under $15, but not enough to afford rent:
6. A studio in Frisco - which is a short commute to the slopes of Vail, Breckenridge and Keystone ski resorts - rents for $2,500. Kristine's take-home pay of under $2,900 simply doesn't leave enough leftover.
7. Parkers shop for fresh produce because its hard to cook out of their cars and pay for a membership at the local rec center to bathe. Workforce housing in towns like these are always on the minds of city officials but it takes years to build, and the housing crisis is happening *now.*
8. Opposition to these kind of parking lots remains fierce and recently similar lots were shut down in a hiking destination in Arizona and in a river rafting town in Colorado, after angry homeowners pushed back, worried that such lots would create a homeless encampment.
@erinschaff 9. To learn more, please read our article and join us in the Comment section: