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09.28.09 | Three homes for deserving Missoula families undergo construction
It wasn’t tough to convince a dozen or so employees to drop their work and head out of the office for a day of manual labor on a sunny fall day in Missoula. A team of Washington Companies employees joined community volunteers to perform finishing work on two Habitat for Humanity homes. In total, the organization will complete three houses this year in the same neighborhood.
Three Missoula families will soon call the buildings "home." These families, like all Habitat for Humanity clients, provide 500 hours of “sweat equity” into their home. Friends and family members may help the homeowners with up to 250 of the 500 hours, but it is important to the organization that home owners gain “…a sense of self pride as well as a new knowledge and understanding of the building process and [their] home in general.”
Habitat families pay back the cost of their home, but receive a no-interest mortgage, resulting in a lessened financial burden. The mortgage payments on Habitat homes are set to be about 25% of the family’s income. Many Habitat applicants are often in living situations which are far too small for their family and are many times in homes considered substandard with leaky roofs, bad plumbing and electrical wiring problems.
The Missoula organization of Habitat is part of a larger international organization, Habitat for Humanity International. Habitat International has presence in more than 90 countries, including all 50 states of the United States, the District of Columbia, Guam and Puerto Rico.
For over a decade, the Dennis and Phyllis Washington Foundation has partnered with Habitat for Humanity of Missoula to construct new homes in the community. Habitat completes projects solely through volunteer labor and donations of money and materials.
From top left: Mike Halligan (Washington Business Services), Al Brulé (Envirocon) Paul Morton (WBS), Brent Mueller (Montana Rail Link)
Kneeling: Patty Seabaugh (MRL)
Seated: Wanda Russell (MRL) and Terri Cheff (WBS),
Also volunteered but not pictured: Andy Morse, Steve Ashton, Jolene Slingsby and David Chenault (WBS)
MRL’s Brent Mueller cuts in the walls on the stairs of the Habitat Home. This particular home had a finished basement to accommodate a family with four children.
