The plan was that houses would be built with no profit added and no interest charged. Building would be financed by a revolving Fund for Humanity. The fund's money would come from the new homeowners' house payments, donations and no-interest loans provided by supporters and money earned by fund-raising activities. The monies in the Fund for Humanity would used to build more houses.    

In September 1976, Millard and Linda called together a group of supporters to discuss the future of their dream. Habitat for Humanity International (HFHI) as an organization was born at this meeting.

In 1984, former U.S. President Jimmy and his wife Rosalynn took their first Habitat work trip. Their personal involvement brought the organization national visibility and sparked interest in Habitat's work across the nation. Today Habitat has built more than 200,000 houses, sheltering more than 900,000 people in more than 3,000 communities worldwide—in over 100 countries and in every state of the union.

    Following her new-found purpose, Sue was eager to work with Habitat.  In 2003, Sue applied for and was accepted by a program at American Express, which gives selected employees a paid three-month sabbatical to work with a non-profit organization. In her first experience on the job site,  she says, “I was so touched by the heart and passion of Habitat, and when I saw the paltry amount of tools they had with which to build houses, I decided to design a marketing program called Tools for Habitat.”  As if by divine plan, the start of her sabbatical coincided with a community program called the Week of Caring.  Taking advantage of the timing, Sue asked The Home Depot for cardboard boxes.   Volunteers then placed these boxes at various businesses to collect donated tools.  “I wanted to make it easy for people to make a difference,” she says, “even if they didn’t have the time to come out and do the actual building.”

Into each box, she put a wish list of tools of varying costs, so that people could purchase or donate a tool that would be within reach of everyone’s budget.   The timing could not have been more perfect, as Habitat had just opened two new sites.  Says, Sue, “The donated tools allowed us to have enough tools for both sites.  In fact, I can’t begin to describe how many tools we collected. I was amazed at the generosity of people.  It was like Christmas.”

When it was time for Sue to return to work at American Express, she realized that her heart was with Habitat,” She says, “I knew that’s what I wanted to do with my life.  At the end of 2004, there was an opening at Habitat and I jumped at the chance.  I started working here as Director of Development last year on Valentine’s Day, 2005.  It is my job to find funding sources so we can continue our mission.  I absolutely adore this organization and there is not a day that goes by that I can’t wait to get to my job--whether it’s meeting with donors or volunteers, speaking at lunches to tell the Habitat story, or putting on a hard hat and working at a site.”

Having safe, affordable housing has an immediate, long-range, and far-reaching effect on the lives of families and communities.  “At one of our house dedications, says Sue, “a woman told us that she says a prayer of gratitude every day for her Habitat house, and that this was the first time in two years that she had had heat in her home.  This really hit me hard.  At another dedication, a woman recalled how her family’s former house had leaked so badly that they had to put tarps over the bed, so that when it rained they would stay dry.  We have pictures of prior living conditions, which show a hole in a roof so large that daylight is visible, or rooms without windows, or openings where rats and mice come in.  In some homes, the children were constantly ill because of the mold.”

Sue continues, “We don’t just build houses and wish people luck.  We also have classes on finances and how to handle money.  The skills that people learn in the course of building their own house is invaluable for helping them later to maintain their property.  If you drive up and down the street, you can see the care and pride of ownership.  “Even before they move in, they have met their neighbors during construction, and have already established a sense of community. There is magic in the process. There are continuing success stories.  Children, for example, have a much better chance of going on to college because they have a bedroom of their own where they can study.”

Yesterday as I was writing Sue’s interview, I received my March copy of the organization’s newsletter, Habitat World.  A few quotes from the publication hammer home some challenging and exciting developments.

•  “Only 25 percent of Americans now work in jobs that provide middle-class wages, according to a study by the Center for Economic and Policy Research.…another 25 percent of jobs don’t pay even a poverty-level income.”
•  “The Census Bureau says 1.1 million more people fell into poverty in the United States in 2004.”
•  “One year after the 2004 tsunami devastated coastal areas of India, Sri Lanka and Thailand, Habitat for Humanity had provided more than 6,000 families direct housing assistance.
  
• From 2005 to the end of 2007, Habitat’s recovery strategy will be to lend direct housing assistance to 20,000 families, and through a network of Habitat resource centers, assist another 10,000 to 15,000 in disaster mitigation services and training in construction and materials fabrication.”
•  In New Orleans, as part of the post-hurricane rebuilding effort, Habitat is planning to build a village of homes for qualifying displaced New Orleans musicians to preserve and celebrate the cultural heritage of the area.  
• Reconciliation is the major theme of the March newsletter, describing the compelling effects of bringing Catholics and Protestants together to build housing and community.  “Since 1994, Habitat for Humanity International has established itself in Belfast and throughout Northern Ireland not only as a house builder, but even more importantly as a peace-builder, interpreting a decent, affordable house not so much as an end in itself but as the means to a much larger end of unity and accord.”
  

If you are looking for a worthy purpose, I encourage you to get involved by joining a building team in your local chapter, staying informed by subscribing to the newsletter, or by sending a donation.  For example, $10 buys a box of nails; $35, Shingles, $50, a low flow toilet, $100 a kitchen sink, $150 a front door, $500 exterior siding, $1,000 wallboard, $2,000 flooring.

If you’d like to contact Sue at the Mt. Diablo chapter of Habitat for Humanity in Contra Costa County, California, email her at   sue@mtdiablohabitat.org, or telephone (925) 288-0112 extension 12.  For the international website, please go to www.habitat.org.

Happy March!
Carol Adrienne