Get Marty: Family With 3 Children Found Living In Storage Unit

A family of five was found living in a pair of storage units in Verona with no electricity, no toilet and no running water; KDKA's Marty Griffin reports.

[davidmayhall]

It says Self storage on the sighn. I'm just storing myself. Ipaid my bill

[mothra__]

they say services are available, but from my experience, the requirements that allow you to qualify for those services are really strict and contradictory.

[alirashidgmai]

It’s legal to be homeless in streets, but it’s illegal to live in storage unit!

[re]

I did this for awhile cz i did not have a car to live in. it was cold at that time, but it should not matter what you do with you storage as long as you make your monthly rent payments and dont cause any problems!!!

[jessicah]

I used to work at a "nice" homeless shelter in Texas, and the "help" is stretched thin and underfunded. The rooms were three bunk beds in a 10x10' room, one bed for each wall, the fourth wall had a closet. Resident's stuff was always getting stolen. There weren't enough bathrooms to allow the residents time to shower every day. You had enough time to brush your teeth and wash your face. Dinner every night was spaghetti and a slice of white bread. Curfew was 7pm, which isn't flexible with the working hours in most retail/fast food/service industry jobs. So getting a job to get out of that situation is even more difficult. 25% of our residents had Bachelors degrees and once held jobs that would pay for a middle class life, if you are saying these people got in that situation by their own doing, you are wrong. They had weekly drug tests and would get evicted if they failed their second one. It's not anything close to luxurious, I would live in my car or a storage unit over that place. The one nice thing was that they allowed you to keep 1 dog or cat, a new rule, the residents used to have to give up what was often their only loving family member. I just cringe when people say there is always help, that help is insufficient.

[TaylorBlack]

"They asked us for help, so we immediately called the police!"

[angryBorderschick]

Living in a storage unit is sadly cheaper than a studio or 1-bedroom apartment.

[coinslotsandjoysticks]

At least they are together, that's what is important, and they were clean and fed, I have nothing but respect for them for keeping the kids safe and not being on drugs !! We all need a little help sometimes 🙏🙏🙏🙏

[lori]

There are a lot of comments on here where people are being exceptionally judgmental.

Millions of people in United States are one or two paychecks away from something like this happening to them. You lose your job, get injured or sick…you hope that your savings will last while you look for a new job or while you recover. But rent and expenses quickly eat up your savings...until both your money and options are gone...and then you lose the roof over your head.

Thankfully, here in the United States we have safety nets for situations like this...public assistance and other programs. Yet, many of you would judge people who ask for assistance, as well.

For all who are so quick to make judgments, I truly hope that if you're ever in a position where you need help that people do not do the same to you.

[ryanmeier]

"they could be charged with endangerment of children" wow you're such a good guy. Really helping keeping families together. Cancel this guy wth

[rdxhate]

They said they would help, and then they called human services on them.

[anotherfoodvlogger]

Wow. They evicted a family of 3. Teared apart a family for keeping the man made "laws" for money. For greed. For their arrogant pride looking down to those people who can't afford a house

[stringermedia]

Main Stream Media acts like this is something new. It has been going on for years. Everyone turns a blind eye to the homeless. Then when they do something like this to avoid living in the elements on the streets. The county gets mad and wants to prosecute. Makes no sense when you see people trying to get out of their position. The storage facility I rent from has about 7 people living there. But I think the owners know and are only looking at the money value. And my city is also anti homeless. They don't offer any long term solution as most small cities. This is a result of people either down on their luck, Homeless after released from jail or drug use. When both President Trump and Hillary were campaigning. Neither one ever mentioned anything about the homeless. Pretty Sad!

[RobertForseee]

For those of you who have never experienced homelessness, let me tell you, this is so so much better than living in a car or even worse on the streets. This would be a homeless persons dream.

[christinapiercey]

So he calls social services, child pertective services, yeah that's helping the family.Helping them rite to jail...

[danor]

They got a place to live.  Only because the news was involved.  It went public.  The housing service had no choice but to help this family because they were on the news.  I'm sure they applied for emergency housing and were either denied, or were on some waiting list.  If it wasn't for them being on the news, they would still be living there.

[justinbarney]

FYI: For those considering doing this, more-than-often(especially non-climate controlled storage), the inside walls are often painted with a mixture of paint & pesticide. The idea is to keep bugs out. But when it gets hot inside, the pesticide becomes much more active, and thus pesticide into the lungs becomes deadly. The same idea applies if/when someone uses a heater(to keep warm) inside the container.

[miss_typo_a_lot]

Who can blame them? did you see rent prices?

[bigpoppajersh]

Shoot when i was homeless i couldn't get emergency housing assistance because i was homeless

[StillHipAnOldGuy]

When you do something like this, you're supposed to be discreet; you're not supposed to leave cigarette butts out in the place and become a nuisance