Woman was living inside rooftop grocery store sign for a year

Contractors curious about an extension cord on the roof of a Michigan grocery store made a startling discovery: A 34-yearold woman was living inside the business sign, with enough space for a computer, printer and coffee maker, police said.

“She was homeless,” Officer Brennon Warren of the Midland

Police Department said Thursday. “It’s a story that makes you scratch your head, just somebody living up in a sign.”

The woman, whose name was not released, told police she had a job elsewhere but had been living inside the Family Fare sign for roughly a year, Warren said. She was found April 23.

Midland, best known as the global home of Dow Inc., is 130 miles north of Detroit.

The Family Fare store is in a retail strip with a triangle-shaped sign at the top of the building. The sign structure, probably 5 feet wide and 8 feet high, has a door and is accessible from the roof, Warren said.

“There was some flooring that was laid down. A mini desk,” he said. “Her clothing. A Keurig coffee maker. A printer and a computer — things you’d have in your home.”

The woman was able to get electricity through a power cord plugged into an outlet on the roof, Warren said.

There was no sign of a ladder. Warren said it’s possible the woman made her way to the roof by climbing up elsewhere behind the store or other retail businesses.

“I honestly don’t know how she was getting up there. She didn’t indicate, either,” he said.

A spokesperson for SpartanNash, the parent company of Family Fare, said store employees responded “with the utmost compassion and professionalism.”

Warren said the woman was cooperative and quickly agreed to leave. No charges were pursued.

“We provided her with some information about services in the area,” the officer said.