‘There goes the neighborhood’
Monday, November 5, 2007 1:08 PM PST
The headline once meant the imminent decline of a once desirable place to live. It takes on a positive spin when Habitat for Humanity blows into town and 36 folks from the Hill help. turn out to help.
By Frank Brown, Peninsula News
Habitat for Humanity, led by Nobel Peace Prize-winner and former President Jimmy Carter, stormed into San Pedro this week with hundreds of volunteers bent on making life better for some families who live on the margins of society. A number of Peninsulans worked side by side with the hundreds of volunteers who began each day at 7 a.m. and worked late into the afternoon for a week.
Help from Hill
Peninsulan Jim Scrimger said that Habitat’s preliminary numbers noted that three Peninsula cities provided 36 volunteers: Rancho Palos, 23; Palos Verdes Estates, 9; Rolling Hills Estates, 4 and Rolling Hills, 1.
Nearly one in five of Los Angeles County’s 10 million residents live in poverty. The median cost of a home today far exceeds the majority of its population’s reach.
Income needed
A week ago, the Los Angeles Times headlined the fact that the average family in this metropolis must have an income of $64,000 annually to live in this part of Southern California.
Overseas help
Among the volunteers working beside Carter and his wife, Rosalynn, were men and women from as far away as Seoul, Korea, and as near as the Palos Verdes Peninsula. The Carters spent their days working in a home at the end of the development labeled simply as the Vicenio family.
The Vicenio home is one of 30 Habitat homes being built on two sites in Los Angeles and part of 100 homes abuilding or being rehabilitated by Habitat before the end of the year.
J.H. Moon from Seoul, one of many from Citi Corp, is the house leader on unit 5-B, which was nothing but a bare spot on the ground last week. His company paid round-trip fares for him, team member Dave Kaltenrieder from St. Louis, and Cynthia Ryan from Madison, Wisc., to work with the other Habitat volunteers. When asked what happens with his daytime job while he’s away, Kaltenrieder said, “I take my job with me,” fishing a Blackberry out of his pocket.
Moon said he’s not too bothered by his office because, “While I’m working here, they’re asleep in Seoul.” With an MBA in business from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, Moon probably can manage both time zones, his volunteer time away and his job back home.
Hill people help
Not all the workers are from out of town or out of the country. Stacey Allocco of Rolling Hills had a nanny take care of her 4-month old daughter so she herself could pitch in. Allocco was assigned to “A Brush With Kindness” project for which workers help restore the neglected exteriors of homes in the immediate area to their original state.
Bill Pomerantz of Rolling Hills Estates, no stranger to Habitat, compared the L.A. County restrictions with those of other states.
“Building codes here are very strict,” he said. “The plans they follow here are highly detailed and voluminous. When I was in South Dakota, we were handed a sketch of what we were supposed to build. Nevertheless, we finished the job and when I said we were ready for inspection, I was told, ‘We don’t do any inspections.’”
Overkill pays
Pomerantz said that one of his favorite Habitat stories happened in Florida. “After a hurricane knocked down Homewood many of the houses left standing were Habitat homes.” Pomerantz explained that while an ordinary carpenter will hammer in a single nail, “Habitat’s will knock in eight.”
Churches help too
Dr. Clayton Cobb of St. Peter’s by the Sea cited the work of his parish and others in raising $160,000 for the Habitat project.
“Jean McDonald,” he said, “has both passion and compassion. She and others from St. Peter’s, St. Luke’s and the South Bay raised the money for what we call not the Presbyterian but ‘the Sanchez’ home.”
Photo: Painting the Future Jean McDonald, right, touches up some of the exterior paint on the home of Mercedes Sanchez, who is performing some of the 500 sweat equity hours required of each occupant 16 years of age and older. McDonald also put the touch on parishioners at St. Peter’s by the Sea parish, St. Luke’s and other South Bay parishes and led a fund-raising effort that raised more than $160,000.
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