Jewell Co. couple donates camper, RV park owner offers a place to live

By CRISTINA JANNEY
Hays Post

James Arnold’s friend Preston Wolf said James was almost in tears when a stranger pulled in at Wolf Furniture Galleries on Friday morning with a camper — a camper that was going to be James’ new home.

James has been homeless for 16 years. About a year and half ago James moved into a makeshift shelter cobbled out of cardboard, shipping pallets and sheets of plastic behind the Hays furniture store

Wolf, owner of Wolf Furniture, has been trying to help James get back on his feet. However, on Oct. 30 the City of Hays sent Wolf a letter saying Arnold had to leave his shelter by Friday because the property was not zoned residential.

Caroline von Lintel, owner of the RV Village on Vine, read a story Hays Post about Arnold and offered a camper pad at her park with all fees and utilities paid.

She was looking for a camper when Spencer Mohler of Randall, Kan., contacted von Lintel after seeing the story about James on social media. He let her and Wolf know Arnold could use his family camper indefinitely.

Mohler and his wife cleaned out the camper Thursday night, and Spencers drove the camper to Hays this morning for James.

“James was kind of peaking around the corner and tip toeing around, and when he found out that was his, it was if he just got issued a new lease on life,” von Lintel said. “There’s a spring in his step, and he said ‘I’m going to have a barbecue for everybody in the summer time.’ ”

The von Lintels also own the Wendy’s in town, and she said she would look into hiring him at the RV park or at Wendy’s.

“We want to get him in front of the people he needs to figure out where he’s at and what he needs,” she said. “Once we have that and feel he has his feet on the ground, we’ll just offer more opportunities as he is able to take it on.”

Von Lintel has a history of working with homeless shelters, including Esther’s House and another shelter in Arizona.

“I’ve had some hard times myself. I’ll be honest with you,” she said. “When I read that, I know that feeling. I know what he felt. I just felt it. I said, ‘No, no, no, we are Hays. We can do this. Maybe Hays doesn’t have something in place now, but maybe this will create the synergy to get something in place. We are not a cold-hearted community. We care.’ ”

She continued, “People want to help. They just don’t know how. Hays is an amazing community. You don’t know how many calls I have got about clothes and food and bedding and whatever he needs.”

Von Lintel said she got more out of helping James than he did, because she knows now he can have some peace and start rebuilding his life.

“There is no one who needs to be homeless in Hays,” von Lintel said. “We can figure something out.”

Spencer Mohler, 26, said his family did not have much invested in the camper, were not using it and saw a chance to help someone else.

“I have never been homeless and I hope I never am homeless, but things do happen,” Mohler said. “I’ve been in lower places, and I know what it’s like trying to get out of whatever might be going on to get back on your feet and sometimes you need a little bit of help. I only had $1,500 in the camper, and that probably felt like $1 million to him.”

Mohler said they have opted to retain ownership of the camper for now, so James doesn’t have to pay the taxes.

When Mohler first brought up the idea of letting James use the camper to his wife, she said he was nuts. However, she read the story about James and the couple ultimately decided allow James to use the camper.

“If I can help someone who just a little worse off than I am, it’s all worth it,” he said.

Von Lintel and Wolf said they were flooded with calls and contacts of people hoping to help James in some way.

Someone donated an ACCESS bus pass. On the Rocks has offered him meals. Someone from LINK has offered to help James fill out paperwork to apply for assistance with medical needs.

James had few words Friday. He seemed overwhelmed, but happy and grateful. He talked about his goals of finding work and saving money. “Security,” he said excitedly. He knows know he has a place he and his belongings can be safe.

“I have knots in my stomach,” he said. “I have butterflies.”

Sitting on the couch in the camper, a huge grin curled over his wrinkled face.

“I ain’t homeless no more,” he said. “I have a home.”

Hays has no homeless shelter. First Call for Help is working on a project to build a transitional housing unit in its current building at 607 E. 13th. You can donate to that project by clicking here.

UPDATE: ‘I ain’t homeless no more’; community rallies in support of man in need

By BECKY KISER
Hays Post

The city of Hays says it’s doing everything it can to address a zoning issue involving a homeless man illegally living behind Wolf Furniture Galleries, 4213 Vine.

An Oct. 30 notification letter from Planning, Inspection, Enforcement Superintendent Curtis Deines to owner Preston Wolf declared that Arnold’s shelter had to be gone from the Wolf property by Friday.

Hays city commissioners brought up the issue at the end of their meeting Thursday night.

Eber Phelps said the Hays Police Department “does not go out and harass anybody and run them off.”

“That’s been a rumor going around that police have been hard on people out there and that couldn’t be further from the truth,” he said. “Actually, they go out there (near Walmart) and tell them all the assistance that’s available (locally).”

He specifically mentioned the Ellis County Ministerial Alliance and First Call for Help.

Phelps said he’s talked previously to Police Chief Don Scheibler about the issue of people panhandling in the Walmart shopping area.

“He said there’s three categories. People that have broken down on the highway and don’t have a way to get the money for a new transmission or whatever, so their only avenue is to possibly ask for contributions to get themselves on the road. There are organizations in Hays that will contribute to that.

“The next group of people that are out there are literally homeless. A lot of them have health issues and what have you. They’re just there trying to get enough money for their next meal.

“There’s a third group Scheibler contends have a place to live, have a vehicle, and don’t want any assistance whatsoever. They just like to panhandle for money, I guess.”

City Attorney John Bird got involved after the PIE department determined the shelter created by James Arnold should not be maintained in a commercially zoned area.

“The city manger directed all the staff to back up and look at the whole situation with some compassion,” Bird said. “There isn’t anybody who is getting disenfranchised or getting kicked out of the place they are. … The city is doing everything, as far as I can tell, to address the legal problem – the zoning issue – without having the unintended consequence of having somebody ground up by the system.

“That’s not going to happen while this city manager (Toby Dougherty) is here or I’m here,” Bird added.

Bird told Hays Post Friday morning “the city will not take any action to evict Arnold or remove his structure until we know all the facts.”

According to Bird, the city first became aware of the situation when Arnold appeared in court for allegations of threatening someone with a knife.

Bird said the city is looking into pending court matters and might be able to get help for Arnold through the court system. According to Bird, the Ellis County Sheriff and county attorney’s offices normally get involved in any sort of mental health petition.

“It was never our intent to move quickly (on this),” Dougherty said to Hays Post Friday. “After the notification period is up, we’ll look again at all our options.”

Vice-Mayor Shaun Musil and Mayor Henry Schwaller both complained Thursday night about inaccurate statements made on social media regarding a Nov. 14 Hays Post news story about the situation.

“Maybe you should ask before you go on social media and complain how bad our city is, because our city is pretty darn good,” Musil said. “I really believe in this community and there ain’t a person in this town that wouldn’t help a homeless person if they had the ability to do that.”

Musil said he read on social media where people have offered the use of a camper for Arnold.

“That’s our community right there, whether he takes advantage of it. So possibly that brought out a good thing.”

Schwaller urged anyone who’s angry to get together and form a homeless coalition in Ellis County.

“Take that anger and that time it took to post those comments and solve this problem. … We have a lot of resources but not enough,” Schwaller said. “That’s what makes this community great. When we have a problem, we solve it.”

By BECKY KISER
Hays Post

A resolution to begin condemnation proceedings of  some private properties near the proposed North Vine Street Corridor Improvements was approved 4-1 by Hays city commissioners Thursday night.

Mayor Henry Schwaller voted against the resolution. He has previously expressed opposition to the proposed design.

Drafted by John Bird, city attorney, the resolution is essentially administrative and does not designate any particular property.

“City staff, and I’m not including myself in this, has been diligently negotiating with land owners and with quite a bit of success,” Bird told the commission.

“But we can’t count on all  of them having been signed up by the deadline imposed by our grant from the federal government calling for this project to be underway.”

Since May, WSP Engineers has been developing design plans for the construction of improvements to North Vine between 32nd and 41st Streets to include four traffic roundabouts.

Appraisals and compensation estimates were prepared. On September 26 the city commission authorized making offers to adjacent properties for the necessary easements and rights of way to construct the project.

According to Bird, the resolution authorizes the use of eminent domain and calls for the city manager and city staff to cause legal descriptions of the properties to be prepared.

“We’ve been working on those so we know we can do that quickly.”

Final action on any actual eminent domain would occur at the Nov. 26 commission meeting, although it will be reviewed first at the Nov. 21 work session.

“We hope we can come back to you and tell you it won’t be necessary at all,” Bird said, “but I don’t want you to be overly optimistic on that. We just don’t know until we’re done talking to various landowners.”

John Braun, city project manager, told Hays Post after the meeting that approximately 70% of the property negotiations have been successful.

“I’m very optimistic we’ll be able to reach an agreement with about half of the remaining 30% ,” Braun said. “There’s 10-15% of the properties we just don’t know about.”

“In order to give the few remaining property owners time to come to an agreement before those legal descriptions are published, we will wait until Thursday’s work session to have the legal descriptions to you and to the press,” Toby Dougherty, city manager, told the commission. Agenda information is provided to commissioners on Mondays prior to Thursday meetings.

Commissioner Sandy Jacobs and Vice-Mayor Shaun Musil both said their affirmatives votes were carefully considered.

“This is a very serious thing we have to do to accomplish this project in front of us, which we got $6 million for from the federal government,” Jacobs said.

“Condemnation is not something we really want to do. It’s something we have to do to finish the job we started.”

“I don’t enjoy doing this,” agreed Musil, “but it’s something we have to do if we do want to move forward.

“I just truly believe that this is going to be good for the city of Hays way past when I’m a commissioner. That’s why I’m for it.”

Musil also noted he’d read online social media comments that said the city was trying to put one local business in the corridor out of business.

“That couldn’t be further from the truth. Actually, one business, I believe, is actually going to gain space with the project the way it’s laid out,” Musil said.

“Me being a small business owner, that’d be the last thing I’d want to do is put somebody out of business.”

Musil is the owner of Paisley Pear Wine Bar, Bistro and Market in downtown Hays.