Pattie Roseboro calls the Blackmon Road community home, and she's not planning to move. Neither are her neighbors.

"The people really love where they stay," said Roseboro, 37. "They're happy."

Yet some residents live in makeshift homes, including old buses and mobile homes. Some even squat, calling home wherever they lay their heads.

Roseboro is one of 25 residents who turned out Saturday for a meeting with Blackmon Road community landowners and long-term residents. The meeting was held at A Place for Hope, the community center located in the impoverished neighborhood just outside Rock Hill.

Members of the Blackmon Road Renewal Working Group also participated in Saturday's meeting. The group hopes to bring lacking services to the community. The group will meet Jan. 31 to start planning the community's revival.

Tom Aggeles, director of operations at A Place for Hope, said the event was geared toward helping Blackmon Road residents voice concerns and helping shape the future of their community.

"We're here to empower that effort," he said. "We're here to foster the idea that people who live in this community have control over their own destiny and that of their children."

Most residents do not have running water or sewage but instead use a common well. Others have no heat except for kerosene heaters that are few in number. Electricity is scarce, too, so some residents rely on candles or flashlights for light.

"It's a lot like triage," Aggeles said. "The need is so immediate."

Al Greene, York County manager, said no community is any stronger than its weakest link.

"As long as we have areas of the county where folks don't have access to employment opportunities, health services and sanitary facilities, then it will reflect on all of us," Greene said.

Aggeles said the York Baptist Association purchased a half acre in the community. He hopes the land purchase will usher change.

"It puts a clearly defined element in the community to initiate changes," Aggeles said. "The group plans to buy more property and possibly build future homes for low-income families and first-time buyers."

Roseboro, a single mother of three, hopes to build a three- bedroom home in the community. After a failed marriage, Roseboro returned to her mother's five-room trailer, where she's lived for nearly 15 years with her son, Tim. Although the home has electricity and sewage, Roseboro hopes having the new home will reunite her with daughters Patricia, 15, and Joy, 11, who live with their father in York County.

Other residents are tired of living without basic needs. Local businessman Dilip Patel said the needs are everyday conveniences often taken for granted. "People don't realize until they come down here what it means not to have water and sewer and electricity, your basic necessities that most people take for granted."

Eva Mae Whitlock's house is nearly falling. It sits on unstable, crumbling cinderblocks.

Aggeles explained the house sits on soil that isn't stable enough to support the house. Without adequate drainage, water pools under the house, causing one side to fall.

Another resident's walls are marred with rat holes. Donna McLaughlin, founder and director of A Place for Hope, wants the children of the community to have the same opportunities as every other child. "It begins with revitalizing the neighborhood."

For details on A Place for Hope, call 329-HOPE.

Contact Toya Graham at 329-4062 or tgraham@heraldonline.com.

The York Baptist Association has established kerosene heating fuel fund. Those desiring to help can make donations to the York Baptist Association/A Place for Hope at any Bank of America in the Carolinas.

Checks for heating fuel can be mailed to A Place for Hope, 222 Kings Mountain St., York, SC 29745, or to York Baptist Association, 434 Museum Road, Rock Hill, SC 29730.

[Pattie Roseboro] is one of 25 residents who turned out Saturday for a meeting with Blackmon Road community landowners and long-term residents. The meeting was held at A Place for Hope, the community center located in the impoverished neighborhood just outside Rock Hill.

Tom Aggeles, director of operations at A Place for Hope, said the event was geared toward helping Blackmon Road residents voice concerns and helping shape the future of their community.

Roseboro, a single mother of three, hopes to build a three- bedroom home in the community. After a failed marriage, Roseboro returned to her mother's five-room trailer, where she's lived for nearly 15 years with her son, Tim. Although the home has electricity and sewage, Roseboro hopes having the new home will reunite her with daughters Patricia, 15, and Joy, 11, who live with their father in York County.