Hesston College students, faculty, and staff will build a home September 21-23. Volunteers will build a frame, gather for a service of blessing, and dismantle the frame in panels for shipment to Picayune, Mississippi, and eventual reassembly and finishing. The project will be part of the college’s “Living the Vision” Centennial Homecoming festivities with the blessing service scheduled for 11:30 a.m., Sunday, Sept. 27.

The Kansas Mennonite Disaster Service (MDS) unit committed to the project under MDS’s Partnership Home Program (PHP) and Hesston College joined as a sponsoring agency. PHP pairs local volunteers-in this case the Kansas MDS unit and Hesston College’s Disaster Management Program-with a remote client who needs a home.

The client for the Hesston project is a single man in his 50s who resides in a 20’x22′ house that has been condemned by local authorities. He has had knee surgeries on both knees and a hip replacement and is legally blind but sees well enough to mow with his riding mower so he mows his and his neighbors’ lawns. He lost his trailer when a tree, blown by Hurricane Katrina, fell on its roof four years ago and has lived in the small house since then.

“The primary objective of the Partnership Home Program is to build homes for those people who have the most needs,” commented Disaster Management Program Director Russ Gaeddert. “PHP also aims to involve many local volunteers in their home communities and in the eventual construction in the client’s community. As with many MDS projects, clients are often uninsured, under insured, single parent families, those with disabilities, or elderly.”

The Hesston part of the project will take place in a Hesston College parking lot along Main St. at the northeast corner of campus. Volunteers will work 90 minute shifts, 10 workers per shift, five shifts per day, for three days. Gaeddert anticipates that Hesston College students, faculty, and staff will fill all the shifts.

Students in the college’s Disaster Management Program will gain construction experience by working on the project and leadership skills by helping to organize volunteers. Newton builder Jim Yoder will manage the construction aspect of the project both in Hesston and in Mississippi. Doris Yoder, Jim’s wife, will serve as head cook in Mississippi. Gaeddert will serve as the overall project manager.

Volunteers will disassemble the completed frame in panels and load it on a semi trailer for the trip to Mississippi. In the ensuing weeks Kansas MDS volunteers will travel to the home site to reassemble and finish the home. Beginning Oct. 3 a van load of eight volunteer workers will depart each Saturday morning for Picayune, Miss., arriving in time for orientation Sunday evening at 7. Volunteers will work a 40-hour week, and return to Kansas Saturday night.

Kansas MDS seeks volunteers for each of the six weeks of the Mississippi portion of the project. “We’ll take skilled carpenters as well as those with no construction experience,” Gaeddert noted. “Each team with have some experienced builders and Jim Yoder to lead the effort.” The unit will provide vans and reimburse most travel expenses. Volunteers will be responsible for their meals en route.

The unit also seeks donations to purchase building materials. To volunteer for or contribute to the project, contact Russ Gaeddert, russg@hesston.edu, 620-327-8294.