Building Homes, Changing Lives
December 10th, 2003
By Archived Story
On November 20, a Thursday night when many college kids were out drinking at the local bars, studying for a test or hanging out with friends, Habitat for Humanity members spent their night sitting on cardboard boxes outside the St. Paul Capitol. Group members participated in “Night Without a Home” in conjunction with Hamline University.
By sleeping outside like the homeless, the group hoped to raise awareness on their struggle, shatter stereotypes, and “challenge Minnesota’s legislators and governor to reverse the most harmful cuts made to homeless programs in the 2003 session,” said PR Director Stacy Buehner. The group listened to speakers who worked with shelters to help house homeless in Minneapolis and St. Paul, and speakers who were once homeless and staying in shelters. These two viewpoints gave a broad understanding of what homelessness means in our community today. While several people are sheltered in churches and other organizations, many remain homeless due to the shortage of beds available.
Habitat for Humanity seeks to help provide housing for those who cannot afford a home.
“Habitat was founded in 1976,” said university Habitat President James Westin. “[It] is now the fifth-largest home-producing company or organization in the United States,”
The university’s chapter has 100 active members who work with students from nine other schools in the area to build one home a year. As many as 50 percent of the group’s members had never built houses before joining. Students with little or no building experience are encouraged to come and learn while helping out the community. Working on Fridays and Saturdays, the group completes the home with the help of the family who will move in. The family and/or their friends and relatives are required to work 300-500 hours on their house. Thus, volunteers have direct contact with the people they are helping and vice versa.
Twin Cities Habitat (a larger Habitat branch) chooses families after reviewing applications regarding their financial stability and needs.
“Generally, they are larger families (5 or more people) that used to share a small 1 or 2 bedroom apartment,” Westin said. “When these families move into Habitat Houses, they actually own the home and get enough space for their family at an affordable monthly rate (generally $450 - $600 a month).
“At the same time, the apartment that the family previously occupied would be available to someone else. This frees up affordable apartment space in the Twin Cities which is very hard to find … Habitat’s role in helping the homeless is freeing up those affordable apartments,”
The Habitat homes are built mainly in St. Paul, though sites can be chosen throughout the Twin Cities. Habitat strives to foster morale and pride in communities, while providing opportunity and support.
If you have any questions regarding Habitat for Humanity, check out their website at http://www.tc.umn.edu/~habitat/ or stop by their biweekly meeting on Wednesdays at 5:30 p.m. in the Molecular and Cellular Biology building.
