Future Habitat for Humanity homeowner Rosa Ramos knows a lot more about building than she did before.
The administrative assistant for a commercial construction company in Park City has put in nearly all her required 200 hours of sweat equity, she said Wednesday at the site where a 10-plex is going up in Silver Creek Village. One of the units, when finished, will be hers. It won’t be long now, maybe even before the snow flies in earnest.
She ticked off new skills: siding, painting, trim, dry wall, cabinetry …. She learned by doing on another Habitat project around the corner.
Nearby, volunteers from Wells Fargo were measuring and running a power saw on wood destined to become a cabinet.
“So yeah, if there’s a hole in my wall, I know how to fix it,” the mother of three said over the din. “Now I just come and help out when I can.”
Summit and Wasatch County Habitat for Humanity, around for more than 25 years, has evolved lately from building house by house to neighborhoods, half joked Shellie Barrus, the executive director since 2014. She’s been with the branch since 2010 and worked for the Salt Lake City Habitat for Humanity for eight years before that.
Indeed, the 10-plex building that stands three stories high takes up the length of a short block, and work will begin next spring on another 10-plex on the dirt lot across the street on the same side of Village Green Trail. A four-plex was recently completed, and two single-family homes were built before that in the subdivision.
The projects won’t make a huge dent in housing needs for local workers, but they are something — 26 units planned in the 1,300-unit Silver Creek Village. The development has a total of 330 affordable-housing units planned in all. Habitat is working with the master developer, Village Development Company, which donated the land for the Habitat projects.
Who will move in? Barrus said people like teachers, employees of small businesses and larger employers, in essence the part of the workforce that makes Park City run but cannot afford to plant roots here. Many are single moms raising children.
Ramos rents an apartment now, the same one she’s had for a decade since moving here from Las Vegas. Now she’ll be a homeowner in the community she calls home.
Barrus said there are three basic tests for Habitat for Humanity candidates: need, fit with income guidelines, and what Habitat calls sweat equity. That is, willingness to help build their homes themselves, or in Ramos’ case, help build other Habitat homes in those 200 hours.
She said Habitat serves those whose pay matches with 30% to 80% of median income going to housing.
Barrus began noticing the need for affordable housing spiking around 2013. Well, and then going up and up ever since.
The Habitat housing is deed restricted to 3% growth in value a year, and homeowners need to be locally employed.
Around 6,500 Summit County residents live and work here, while about 11,500 residents commute to Salt Lake City and elsewhere, and around 11,500 workers commute here, according to the Park City Chamber of Commerce & Visitors Bureau. Barrus put the inflow and outflow at around 8,000 commuters in and 8,000 out. A lot, however you count.
“We’re not going to solve all of that,” she said. “That’s a pretty big lift.”
Another part of Habitat’s work is providing financial education.
“Our biggest program is a women’s financial education program,” Barrus said. “We do find we are getting a pretty high amount of single mothers.”
Habitat for Humanity International works in more than 70 countries and has helped over 46 million people find homes or improve their homes since 1976. The roots of the organization began a few years earlier on a farm in Georgia, according to the organization. Former President Jimmy Carter is its most famous face.
Barrus said she and others in Habitat for Humanity nationally are advocating for funding, legislation and programs to help address America’s growing need for affordable housing. Ski towns share an acute problem, but they aren’t alone.
In Park City, Rosa Ramos, with her new skills earned from a long tradition of learning and contributing through sweat equity, continues to help out while counting down the days.
“Just waiting on my new home,” she said. “We’re very excited.”
