Habitat: Getting Ready to Build by Leon Reed

June 28, 2022

If you ask most people what Habitat does, they would describe a busy home construction site, with a few dozen volunteers of all ages, hammering nails, hanging drywall, putting up framing, and painting. And, indeed, the so-called “Blitz Build” is our basic activity, how our houses get built. Without the volunteers who show up for Blitz Build (once or week after week), there would be no Habitat.

Our next homebuilding project, on Orrtanna Rd. in Cashtown, is moving toward that milestone. But a lot of work by a lot of people has to happen before we’re ready for the hammers and saber saws.

To have a project, we need to have a property and a prospective homeowner who meets Habitat qualification requirements. It is an ongoing project of a number of people to identify appropriate properties (the right size, zoning, ideally water and sewer, the right price) and Sue Pindle chairs the committee that screens and approves new homeowners.

Once we’ve decided which property is next and matched it with a homeowner, work kicks into high gear. Hartman & Yanetti, the law firm that donates legal services, reviews the paperwork to make sure all is in order. 

A project flow chart would have a central flow line that could be called “The property.” We need to review the deed, zoning, and any other restrictions on construction. Sometimes we discover, usually when we’re looking at the property, that the neighborhood requires two story houses, or a brick exterior.

The next step is getting the necessary permits from the borough or township where the house will be built. Assuming we’re not doing anything too crazy, this is pretty straightforward but the reviews take a little time.

Once we have our permits, actual site preparation work can begin. The rule of thumb is that, at this point, we’re two months away from our first blitz build. Our construction supervisor, Steve Dague, gets a few experienced volunteers and excavates, pours the foundation, roughs in plumbing, and otherwise gets the site ready.

While all this is going on, a variety of other work away from the property needs to happen. Judy and Bill Leslie, our Family Support chairs, continue teaching the homeowner about the joys of home ownership, including topics like budgeting and home maintenance. Lynn Cairns and Bob Remaley stay in touch with our churches and individual volunteers, making sure they understand the schedule.

In these volatile markets, it’s critically important to keep track of prices and supplies of construction material. A home construction project uses vast quantities of materials like nails, 2x4s, plywood, etc. A sudden price increase or supply shortage can throw the whole project schedule off. In our last project, prices of some materials tripled and we had to scrounge fuse boxes from a contractor friend: they were unavailable at the time we needed one. A lot of the components, such as cabinets, are donated to us, so we have to let our donors know our schedule and order major appliances in time.

Finally, we sometimes have some site specific issues to deal with. For example, there’s no parking for volunteers along Orrtanna Rd., so we had to figure out where volunteers can park and how to get them to the work site. 

And when all this is done, the neighborhood echoes with the sound of hammers and the hum of a construction site – and one more affordable housing unit for Adams County is under construction.