Community Spotlight: Habitat for Humanity of Southeast Ohio

07/15/2022

Community Spotlight: Habitat for Humanity of Southeast Ohio

 

We at The Savings Bank love to spotlight those who make a difference in our communities. One such group is Habitat for Humanity of Southeast Ohio! Maybe you’ve seen them around! They’re currently building in Lancaster, as well as other communities in the region. We took a moment to chat with Stephanie Taylor, Director of Community Engagement for Habitat for Humanity of Southeast Ohio.

 

 

Hi, Stephanie! Thank you for talking to us today. Can you let our readers know a little bit about what Habitat for Humanity does for the community?

 

Habitat for Humanity of Southeast Ohio brings local families, individuals, businesses, and organizations together to build strength, stability, and self-reliance through shelter. We partner with local families in our eight counties in three ways, Homeownership, Critical Home Repair, and Micro-Finance program. All of these programs are designed to provide a hand up not a hand out. One of the biggest misconceptions I often hear is we build our homes and give them away for free, but that is not the case. Habitat for Humanity of Southeast Ohio empowers people who qualify to build and buy their own homes. Our Homeownership Program requires “sweat equity” (250 hours for one adult member and 500 hours for a household with 2 or more adults), the completion of a series of educational classes, a down payment of $1,000.00, and monthly mortgage payments on a zero-interest home loan.

 

How was Habitat for Humanity first established in Fairfield County?

 

Habitat for Humanity of Southeast Ohio was asked to absorb the former Habitat for Humanity Fairfield County affiliate at the end of 2020 and we officially added Fairfield County to our seven counties, making it eight, in early 2021. I was brought on in April 2021 as the Director of Community Engagement covering Fairfield and Hocking Counties. Our first build in Fairfield County broke ground in August 2021 and the new homeowners, the Patterson family, got the keys to their new home in January 2022. We are currently building in Lancaster and have another build planned in Pleasantville in the Spring of 2023. We are also beginning a partnership with the Fairfield Career Center this fall to build homes for us each school year. This program will involve their Construction, HVAC, Plumbing, Electrical and a few other groups. They will build the homes at the career center to about 80% completion and we will then move it in two pieces to the lot and crank it onto the foundation. All of these homes will go into Lancaster or another community in Fairfield County.

 

What’s your favorite part of your job with Habitat for Humanity of Southeast Ohio?

 

That is a tough question to answer. I love so many parts of my job because no day is the same. As the Director of Community Engagement, I get to do just that, engage this great community. Some days I am in different community organization meetings, others I am getting to know new and potential donors, and other days I get the opportunity to be out at the house building with the volunteers and future homeowner(s). So maybe not as hard as I thought because I think this could be summed up to say my favorite part is building relationships.

 

You’re currently working on your first build in Lancaster in some time. What can you tell us about that experience?

 

This current 2022 Lancaster build is not only Habitat for Humanity of Southeast Ohio’s first home built in Lancaster but it is the first Habitat home built here since 2016. It has been a great experience! We knew this community was just as excited as we were to get this project started and they have blown us away with their involvement. We have had church groups, groups from the businesses and organizations who partnered in funding this build, and we even have several regular weekly volunteers. We broke ground at the end of March and we are on track to finish up at the end of August. We hope to give the keys to the new homeowner, Toni a single mom of two, in early September.

 

What advice would you give to people who want to make a difference in their community but aren’t sure where to start?

 

I would tell them there is no shortage of organizations you can get involved in in your community and the best place to start would be to check out your City, County, community websites, and social media for opportunities. Don’t hesitate to even just reach out to an organization that you might be interested in getting involved in and ask how you could be involved. Oftentimes some of our most regular volunteers come from them just showing up and asking how they can help.

 

Where can folks follow Habitat for Humanity online and how can they support?

 

Folks can follow us and keep up with build progress, family and volunteer spotlights, and all our other Habitat projects on Facebook (@HabitatSEO) and Instagram (@habitat_seo). If folks are interested in getting involved by donating or volunteering they can visit our website habitatseo.org where they can directly donate or sign up to volunteer on a build. You can also volunteer, shop, and donate to any of our three ReStores (Athens, Lancaster or Zanesville) which are home and hardware thrift stores. Our ReStores are home and hardware thrift stores. Every home is a building block, every helping hand makes a difference and every donation helps a family help themselves.

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