Making houses into homes

Local Habitat for Humanity grows

Two decades ago, Habitat for Humanity's local chapter worked alongside its first family to realize their unimaginable dream of home ownership.

The next year, one more family moved into a modest home of their own. Then one by one, year by year, each new family worked alongside a crew of other volunteer builders, received the keys, and started making mortgage payments on their new home in Kalispell or Whitefish.

Then everything changed.

In June 2006, two families turned over the first shovels of dirt for their Habitat homes, the first two in an ambitious six-house build site on land donated by the city of Columbia Falls. It was faith in action - faith that the funding to build beyond those first two homes would materialize.

But a new business-minded leadership on the Habitat board, a leadership that didn't leave it to chance, was busy digging up some new pay dirt for the Columbia Falls build.

As a result Lyle Mitchell, a Columbia Falls State Farm Insurance agent, handed over a $6,600 grant in March 2007.

A month later an anonymous donor wrote out a check for $90,000, the entire cost for a new house.

More donations arrived from other sources.

By summer 2007, Habitat had scheduled ground-breaking for the third and fourth homes. Then came the fifth.

Today, the sixth home is roofed and its interior well underway. By early 2008 it will house the final family in the all-Habitat neighborhood.

And that will re-start the cycle, increasing to five new homes in just one year - one in Columbia Falls and four in Whitefish during 2008.

The number for 2009 will be determined by what's sustainable, minimizing volunteer burn-out and maximizing fundraising.

Missy Sweeney is grateful to be one of those Columbia Falls neighbors.

"It was in February, I believe," she recalled the day the phone rang with news that she and her three children finally would have a real home. It was something of a shock after a long stretch scattered to transitory housing.

"I don't know the date for sure, but I had been really sick. I got a phone call from Earlene (the family selection committee chairman) to tell me I had been chosen for a house," Sweeney said. "I had to call her back the next day to see if it was really true."

It was.

So all summer the single mom, who manages the Glacier Center in Coram while attending college to earn her teaching degree, worked at the build site and rounded up family and friends to help fulfill Habitat's requirement for sweat equity. This fall she started her student teaching while building her new home and continuing 40-hour work weeks, which she eventually scaled back.

"It's been a ride," she said.

On Dec. 1 she and her 16-year-old daughter moved into their new home and her sons set out on their own. Reality still is sinking in as she looks toward her first mortgage payment in February.

"We're totally excited about (the house). After the last two months living with friends and everything we had going on, it made us appreciate it," Sweeney said.

"But the journey to it was more than I expected. It was probably a month and a half into it before I could be here and not cry - just because of all the people who came to help. It was awesome."

As Habitat's landmark year wrapped up, other new homeowners were feeling the same.

"It's the start of a new life for my family and kids," one of her neighbors agreed. "It's a lot of work but it's worth it."

It's these changed lives, and the prospect of more, that keep Patti Gregerson and Dave Williams stoked about the work they're doing with Habitat.

Gregerson, the new executive director for the local chapter, and Williams, president of Habitat's board of directors, had the business background it took to reshape a dedicated, big-hearted core of volunteers into a construction company with a plan - and a mission to continue nurturing families long after their first hand-shake.

But changing lives requires more than a shoulder to lean on.

It takes money to build the houses.

Although volunteer labor, in-kind donations of services, and donated materials, money and land keep the cost of each house low, there still is a cost. Families buy the houses interest-free at cost, giving rise to Habitat's ethic of providing a hand up, not a handout.

Still, to raise the money needed to make a serious dent in the Flathead's lack of basic housing and put it to efficient use, they needed to write a business plan.

Williams guided that process and hired the key people to catch the vision and carry it out. After just 18 months, the revitalized effort is being felt in several arenas.

Habitat's existing volunteer committees were beefed up to support volunteers, guide construction, select families, and mentor them on finances, home repairs and maintenance even after they move in. Each committee has members with a level of professional expertise that brings results efficiently.

"It's not about us," Williams said. "It's about the number of people who make a serious commitment" in volunteering for or donating to Habitat.

"You have to give your time in order to get their time," Gregerson added. Both recounted repeated presentations to civic groups, almost daily lunches, breakfasts or conversations over coffee.

"Everyone we've talked with either has been impacted by (lack of) affordable housing or know someone who has been impacted by it," he said. "We are making an impact on the Flathead Valley."

In 2007, they built out the organization to support three houses a year. Next year they will support five houses, with the volunteers needed to get the work done.

In Whitefish, the board is working on land for the remaining four homes after the Columbia Falls house is finished in 2008. They have a commitment for eight lots from the developers of Starling, the 3,000-home Kalispell development proposed near Glacier High School; they're hoping for more after Phase 1 of Starling's construction. Last spring's anonymous $90,000 donor is going to write a check for $100,000 this year, Williams said.

"We've established a track record," he said. "We do what we're saying we're going to do."

The need for accountability in a nonprofit is huge, they said.

So they put more structure around Habitat's finances. They developed policies. Committees have assignments and give progress reports. They follow the biblical principle of tithing and give 10 percent back to Habitat for Humanity International, totaling an amount which now has built 20 homes in other regions.

"That's one thing about Habitat - it's real tangible," Gregerson said. "There's either a house or there's not."

Habitat's "re-store," a surplus building supply store in Kalispell that takes donations of materials and sells them at reduced prices to bring in a cash flow for Habitat's operational expenses, got a real shot in the arm.

"In the past year, we started looking at the re-store as an opportunity to cover (expenses) so 100 percent of our donations can go to houses," he said.

Williams' nephew acted as the first store manager, organizing materials, repricing goods and tracking income, a move that turned it into a genuine business.

As a result, students, retirees, people doing community service and others - 15 regulars at this point - give their time every week to make the business work. Store manager Char Terry "got it to the next level," Gregerson said, and will expand operating hours to Tuesday through Saturday next year.

"It's another success that's due to those volunteers," Williams said.

Such a success, in fact, that the re-store has outgrown its space in the back end of Kalispell Medical Supply and is on the lookout for a bigger building in Kalispell.

They are hoping for an answer to show itself soon. Just a few weeks ago, after receiving notice that the Strand Theater was being sold and Habitat would have to move its office out of its second-level quarters, space was offered in the Glacier Building.

The past year's initiatives alone would produce a pretty healthy organization.

But they work in unison with Habitat for Humanity International's model for growing a local affiliate. They augment partnerships Habitat is forging with developers, city officials, businesses and churches. They grow from the intimate knowledge held by the 25-30 people who volunteer on the various teams.

"We know more about our homeowners than any other lender in the valley, because we work with them," parsing finances and swinging a hammer, Williams said.

Because of this solid foundation, Habitat for Humanity Flathead Valley has a big vision for 2008 and beyond.

Williams characterizes that foundation as a three-legged stool - the banker, the homebuilder and the Christian ministry doing outreach work. The stool never has been sturdier in the Flathead.

And that fact gives Williams and Gregerson great satisfaction, not for the organizational structure but for the impact it's having.

"At the end of the day," he said, "we're getting people out of substandard housing and helping them into safe, affordable housing."

Reporter Nancy Kimball can be reached at 758-4483 or by e-mail at nkimball@dailyinterlake.com