Chattahoochee Valley in Georgia
This year’s Hammerin’ Irish build was hosted by the
Chattahoochee Valley Fuller Center for Housing. This site is special because Milliard Fuller, the founder of Habitat for Humanity and the Fuller Center for Housing, was born and raised in Lanett, AL, one of three cities that make up the Chattahoochee Valley. Once a prosperous textile manufacturing community, today people in the Valley are suffering as a result of thousands of milling jobs being sent offshore.
Nineteen Domer volunteers, from California to Virginia, traveled to Georgia for the weeklong building project. They worked on three homes which are part of a neighborhood renewal project. The Fuller Center tore down a dilapidated apartment complex which was infested with drugs and plagued by crime, and in its place began a now seven home neighborhood of dedicated and deserving families. The Irish worked alongside the future homeowners and did all the siding, preparation for shingling, and soffit work on the houses, and more! All this is 95 degree heat!
Working hard, side by side with people who share one’s belief in service is very uplifting, and all who participated left excited for next year’s build in 2009!
Contact Katie Zakas by phone (574) 631-6723 or by email kzakas@nd.edu for more information.
