Habitat for Humanity camps out to raise awareness
The group’s MU chapter aims to raise $5,000 by the end of the week.
April 18, 2008
Senior Becca Allgire and junior Jim Buell share pizza and conversation Wednesday while living in cardboard boxes on Lowry Mall. Members of the MU’s Habitat for Humanity chapter spent the week living out of boxes and relying on donated food to educate the public about Habitat for Humanity.
Students camped out on Lowry Mall this week to help families in need of better homes.
Members of the MU chapter of Habitat for Humanity set up cardboard boxes and sleeping bags outside the Ellis Library to symbolize poor living conditions and to raise awareness of the issue, MU chapter Co-President John Morrison said. Participants slept in the boxes overnight.
Habitat for Humanity has been on campus since 1993 but has used boxes to grab people’s attention since 1999.
“Students have actually asked us if they could sleep outside in a box for a night with us,” junior Habitat for Humanity member Lauren Aston said.
Habitat for Humanity is an international organization that works to raise money and awareness to improve housing conditions. The MU chapter is trying to raise $5,000 by the end of the week to contribute to the cause.
“We’ve been out here since Monday,” MU chapter Co-President Allie Thebeau said. “Whenever we don’t have classes, we just sit out here and chill.”
The organization was founded in 1976 by Millard and Linda Fuller and has since rehabilitated more than 250,000 houses and sheltered more than 1 million people in more then 3,000 communities worldwide. Eighty houses have been built in Columbia so far, Morrison said.
The MU Habitat for Humanity chapter teamed up with the Columbia Habitat for Humanity branch and the University YMCA.
The Habitat for Humanity chapter helps recruits volunteers to build the houses. Students put up houses during homecoming season in front of the St. Thomas More Newman Center. They also build houses in Columbia in the spring.
“The YMCA is like the mother and Show Me Central is like the father for Habitat for Humanity on-campus chapter,” University YMCA Executive Director Julie Alexander said. “But these guys do all of the work.”
Families who receive homes built by Habitat for Humanity are chosen on basis of need, ability to pay and willingness to partner with the program, according to the Habitat for Humanity Web site.
The family buys the home with no down payment and a nonprofit, no-interest loan. The family will have a monthly mortgage ranging from $230 to $400 monthly, which it must pay off in 15 to 20 years. Families are also required to complete 300 to 350 hours of “sweat equity” by helping put up their homes and those of other families.
“We usually do Saturday monthly builds depending on the weather,” Thebeau said. “We get to meet the families and hear their stories, so we feel sympathy.”
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