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Photo credit: The Eagle |
In this Newsletter
Update:
The Lopez Family (Their daughter Sara just won the Texas Women's Championship in youth boxing!)
Strikeout Poverty Housing - July 21st
Wednesdays at the ReStore
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 MEET KURTIS KEMPER
Texas A&M Student Employee of the Year
We are truly blessed to have Kurtis serve as our Senior Construction Assistant. He's recently won Texas A&M Student Employee of the Year. Here's why.
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LETTER FROM THE DIRECTOR
ReStore - the hidden treasure
When I joined the Habitat staff in 2013, my first role was as the manager of the ReStore. Although I had been a supporter of Habitat for many years, until that time I had not been familiar with the ReStore. I hear that same thing from many of the people I talk to about Habitat, so let me take this opportunity to tell you about one of the most unique parts of the Habitat program.
In 1991, the first ReStore opened in Winnipeg, Manitoba in Canada. The second opened in 1992 in Austin, Texas. Bryan/College Station Habitat opened its ReStore in 1994 behind the office on Lake Street. In 2004, our ReStore moved a block away to 2211 Maloney Street, with a second building across the street at 2208 Maloney. There are now close to 900 ReStores in the US and around the world.
The mission of the ReStore is the same as Habitat: to bring people together to build homes, communities and hope. ReStore accomplishes this primarily through raising funds that help us build houses. Some of the other benefits are providing lower cost building materials and household goods to the community, keeping usable items out of the landfill, and it functions as one of the public faces of Habitat in B/CS.
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This hand-carved Guatemalan coffee table is in stock. |
I like to compare visiting the ReStore to going on a treasure hunt. You never
know what awesome item you might find for
a great deal.That was also my favorite part of working there: getting to meet all the customers and donors and coming across different interesting pieces every day.
We are in the final stages of a major renovation to our store, transforming a building that started out as a plumbing supply store into a location better suited for the diversity of retail you see at our ReStore today. If you've never been by the ReStore before, or it's been a few months, you should come check out the store's new look. You never know what treasure you may find!
In partnership,
Andy York, Executive Director
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UPDATE: THE LOPEZ FAMILY
A few
years ago,
Alvaro and Dulce
Lopez
realized that
their living conditions were making t
heir family sick
.
A serious mold issue, no A/C in the summer or heat
and
adequate insulation
for the winter months was causing all sorts of health problems, not to mention a
creating an all-around
miserable
living environment.
Beyond this immediate need, for many years it was
their
dream to one day own a nice house where they could thrive and grow as a family.
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Sara Lopez at the Jr. Golden Gloves Competition in Houston
Spoiler Alert: She wins all three rounds |
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UPCOMING EVENTS
This Saturday, June 11th,
Join
CAPSHER Technology
,
Knife River Corporation
,
Wells Fargo
,
BBVA Compass
,
Guaranty Bank & Trust
,
Prosperity Bank
, Mid South Baking Company,
Sanderson Farms
,
Douglass Nissan
, and
Hilton Garden Inn Bryan/College Station, TX
as they raise the walls on the Navarro-Gamino family home in our Angel's Gate subdivision as part of our Corporate Challenge.
Wednesdays at ReStore - each Wednesday we offer special discounts. Check out our
Facebook page for details.
A Brush With Kindness - June 18th
FUN Night at the Bombers' game (benefitting Habitat) - June 21st
We are hosting the Bryan+College Station Public Library's English as a Second Language classes this summer on Saturdays in our education building. For more information, contact Clara Mounce Library in Bryan.
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A BRUSH WITH KINDNESS
Sponsored by the Nina Astin Winkler Charitable Trust
Saturday, June 18th BCS Habitat staff and volunteers will provide
A Brush With Kindness to the Taylor family in the McCullough neighborhood of College Station. We will also remove trash along the
entire five-block radius between Arizona and Georgia Streets.
This is an area where we've built eight Habitat houses using in-fill lots and it's an effort to continue helping community members in College Station. Due to high cost of land, we have not built homes in College Station since 2014.
If you'd like to help us expand efforts into College Station's McCullough neighborhood, please contact our
Volunteer Coordinator to sign up! Neighborhood social will follow
A Brush with Kindness.
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RECENT EVENTS
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Photo credit: Bryan Rotary Club
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We recently dedicated the Garcia family home. Home sponsor Bryan Rotary Club surprised the new homebuyers with a special house-warming gift -- the first board of their new fence! Thank you Bryan Rotary Club, Lucille and John B. Dougherty Charitable Trust and to all the volunteers who helped build the Garcia's new home and foundation for their future. Volunteers included Lowe's staff, National Women Build, Panther with a Purpose (Prairie View A&M), Dr. John Rayfield's class, St. Francis Episcopal Church, and the Texas A&M Department of Agricultural Leadership, Education and Communications.
Two homes are under construction and seven families have been accepted into our homeownership program. Home sponsorships help us begin construction and some of these families are still in need of kind sponsors.
Learn more about home sponsorship
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NATIONAL WOMEN BUILD WEEK 2016
Houses into homes for Garcia and Montoya families
On May 7th, we were fortunate to participate in National Women Build Week (NWBW), sponsored by Lowe's Home Improvement.
Lowe's "Lowe's Heroes" staff and Habitat board members
Celia Goode-Haddock and Kathryn Greenwade joined o
ver 50 women volunteers earlier this month in Bryan/College Station to make these houses into homes for the Garcia and Montoya families.
National Women Build Week is a Habitat International initiative developed in partnership with Lowe's. NWBW is about empowering women and providing them opportunities to use their construction skills while helping to support Habitat's mission. Bryan/College Station Habitat for Humanity is thankful to Lowe's for providing us with the resources to host such a great event, as well as our volunteers, with whom our construction process would not be possible.
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Every year Lowe's partners with Habitat for Humanity International and the local affiliates for National Women Build Week. This initiative generates media attention because it brings women together to empower them on the construction site and helps hundreds of families get one step closer to homeownership. While National Women Build Week gets the most attention, Lowe's contributes much more to our community and BCS Habitat than just this one week.
Lowe's continually donates returned, overstocked, discontinued and floor model items to the Habitat ReStore.
The ReStore is an important part of the BCS Habitat mission. Through sales, the BCS Habitat ReStore covers the overhead of the affiliate so fundraising and donations given can go directly to the home building process.
The ReStore is not just a fundraising opportunity for Habitat. ReStore
is a
s
ocial partner with the community by offering a low cost option for building materials and home décor, e
nvironmental partner because it keeps usable materials out of landfills and an economic partner because smaller landfills allows more city funds
to go to other community needs. Year-round, Lowe's helps make all this happen!
Thank you Lowe's for your investment in our community and specifically the lives of our partner families.
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Habitat named #1 builder of affordable housing
For the second year in a row, BUILDER magazine has named Habitat for Humanity as the "number 1 builder" of affordable housing in the United States. Just as in the Brazos Valley, all over the country communities are struggling with a lack of housing that is affordable to many working families. We are proud to be a part of the solution!
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