In Between Housing
Tyrone said he had recently lost his apartment in a fire, but that he was trying to get transitional housing through a Northern Nevada Hopes program.
"We had to move out and I lost everything except my wife," he said of the fire. "That's all I care about though, everything else can be replaced."
He used to get job in warehouses with temp agencies, he said, but now he has feet and ankle problems and also doesn't feel he would get hired because he can't shower much.
"I'm not afraid to work though. I don't scrounge, I don't go through trashes. I try to work for my money. I do some yard work, I fly my sign," he said.
Running Away from an Ex-Wife
Tyrone is from Texas, where he did time in jail, and where says he was also harassed by his ex-wife.
"I did some time in jail in Huntsville, north of Houston, got released, but my ex wife ... kept hassling me, so I decided to move away to Nevada," he said.
Full Shelters and Tickets for Camping
Tyrone said it's not easy navigating Reno homeless when the shelters are full.
"Over here, all they do is give you tickets for camping. The churches help out and then there is the shelter, but the shelter can only hold so many people. There's more homeless people than there are spots. Every time we go down there, it's full. But when we get tickets from police for camping they call down there and they say they have openings. If you put us in jail though, all you are doing is filling up the jails with homeless people," he said.
He feels homeless aren't wanted in downtown Reno.
"They're pushing us out, trying to kick us out, run us out of town, but for us to eat we have to come back into town. Now I see homeless people everywhere, because the motels that they were living in are being torn down," he said.
He has so common sense ideas, but doesn't think the homeless would be trusted by local authorities.
"They have so many empty warehouses they could use and put beds in, put a kitchen in there. Let the homeless run the warehouse. We'd have our own security if they let us have it that way. It would be fine," he said.
Reporting and Photos by Prince Nesta for Our Town Reno