By Jessie Weisner (Twitter: @Jessie__Weisner)

Rocky family receives keys to their Habitat for Humanity home

Sep 24, 2018 | 7:30 PM

A Rocky Mountain House family received keys to their new Habitat for Humanity home Monday.

57 local volunteers worked to renovate the home, which was purchased from funds donated in honor of the late Honorable W. Helen Hunley. Tammy Cote, Hunley’s great niece, and her family donated a significant sum to allow the structure to provide the young family with a home.

In addition, the local Habitat for Humanity Committee rallied to fundraise for the renovation on 53A Avenue.

“It’s been a very rewarding experience to mobilize volunteers and donors to raise funds and complete this home renovation,” says Clark Bertagnolli, project director. “What’s even more rewarding is that a local family now has a bright future ahead of them.”

David and Stephanie Carter along with their four children were chosen to live in the renovated home. David currently works as the director of the local Lords Food Bank, and says home ownership may not have been possible without this generous offer.

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“This is a huge step forward for our family from a financial standpoint alone, but even more than that it’s a wonderful feeling to have our own home,” he says. “I grew up in rental properties and I’ve rented for my entire adult life, this will be the fourth place I’ve lived since coming to rocky eight years ago. We’re so excited to have a place to call our own and for our children to grow up in, to host friends and family, it’s a place to settle down for a while and gather some moss.”

In order to be recipients of the new home, the Carter family had to put in 500 sweat equity hours during the renovation. 100 of those hours were donated by volunteers, and the remaining 400 were achieved through work on the house and in the community.

“A lot of it was here at the house, helping with the renovations and demolition,” says David. “Through that we also did some cooking out at the camp for a weekend and helped out with various church related ministries.”

The family still has to make payments on their new home, but Habitat has set up a program that also allows them to save for their future.

“Our mortgage payments with Habitat are calculated at 25% of our income, this gives a lot of stability because we don’t have to worry about rising interest rates on the one hand, or a change of income situation on the other,” says David. “As long as we can pay that 25% payment we’re secure.”

Habitat for Humanity has been present in Rocky Mountain House for the past eight years, providing three families with newly-renovated homes.

Betagnolli says the local committee’s goal takes providing families with a new home a step further.

“We’ve been here for a while so we’re trying to increase our public profile to allow more people to contribute. We would like to actually do a build at some point because I think a build would draw more people in. That’s our goal as a committee.”