MOORE HAVEN — Glades County Habitat for Humanity is seeking public support and participation for a Wall Raising Ceremony on Friday, Feb. 22, as it begins construction of the county’s first Habitat homes.

Charlotte County Habitat for Humanity and Wallace International Trucks will host a Glades County Economic Development Council business social that day at 10 a.m. at 185 and 199 Avenue M, Moore Haven.

The event will celebrate the wall raising for the first of two site-built homes to be built in Glades County on these adjoining county-donated lots in Moore Haven.



More important, said Gabrielle Reineck, senior director of outreach for Charlotte County Habitat for Humanity (H4H) based in Punta Gorda, which is expanding into Glades, the organization also is still actively recruiting a future homeowner.

Construction actually will begin at 9 a.m. that day at 185 and 199 Avenue M in Moore Haven, with the ceremony set for 10 o’clock.

Potential homeowners sought

Ms. Reineck urges that anyone who meets the following 2018 income guidelines may be able to qualify: $21,900 gross annual income for a single person; $25,020 for a couple; $28,140 for a family of three; $31,200 for four; $33,780 for five; or $36,300 for six. Potential buyers must be able to submit two years’ verification of income and have a workable credit history, with no unsatisfied judgments, charge-offs, liens or repossessions.

They also must be willing to meet these other requirements:

• Sweat equity (300 hours) — the time a family must put into partnering with H4H and community members to construct homes for themselves or others;

• Full participation in an honest and timely manner;

• Commitment to a $1,000 escrow deposit;

• Attendance to program orientation and budget counseling classes, Habitat Homeowner Education and an eight-hour Department of Housing and Urban Development course; and

• Be living or working in Glades County for at least 12 months, and be U.S. citizens or have Permanent Resident Alien immigration status.

H4H, a Christian ministry, welcomes all. Its family selections are made by a volunteer committee whose members base their decisions on need, willingness to partner and ability to pay.

The organization’s stated goal is to assist in meeting the need for decent, affordable housing; to relieve people living in substandard, structurally unsound or dilapidated housing; to help those facing a cost burden where rent payments are 30 percent more of total income; or to relocate those living in overcrowded conditions.

The Glades County Board approved the Charlotte group’s application to serve people here in December, and the county donated the two surplus lots for construction of H4H’s first homes in Glades County.

South Lake O reporter/editor Chris Felker can be reached at cfelker@newszap.com.