Habitat for Humanity Build- Veracruz, Mexico

I wanted to give you a little bit of background about the JCWP. Every year Habitat for Humanity has a special build called the Jimmy Carter work project. Jimmy personally contributes one week of his time to build homes and raise awareness of the critical need for affordable housing. President Carter and Roslyn’s interest with Habitat began in 1984 when they led a work group to New York City to help renovate a six-story building. That experience planted the seed and the Jimmy Carter Work Project has grown to become an internationally recognized event of HFHI ever since.

In October 2004 Veracruz and Puebla, two cities in Mexico, were selected for this build. It takes lots of planning as there must be location and housing selections, local building materials ready and for such a large number of volunteers there must be housing, transportation and food provided. The plan was to complete 150 homes in one week. There were 4,000 volunteers signed up to come from all over the country this year.

Habitat provides the housing and meals for the group. Each morning busses picked up the volunteers from local hotels and were transported to the work site. There were large food tents set up where the meals were served. Each of us was assigned a house number with about 35 volunteers per home. There was a house construction leader in charge of each home. We began at about 8:00 a.m. and finished up each day at 5:00 p.m. The homes we built were a courtyard community style with homes sharing common walls. The building blocks were “Contec” and a Mexalit roof. Each home was 625 Square feet and consisted of 2 bedrooms, a living room, a dining room and a very small kitchen and bath.

All the recipient families built along with the volunteers as well as many local students from the University of Veracruz. It was an intense work schedule but with 35 volunteers per house we were close to completion at the end of the week. At the closing ceremony Jimmy and Roselyn Carter presented each family with a Bible.

In the evenings we had free time to explore the local sites and taste the local cuisine. The town square or “El Zocala” was filled with nightly entertainment. They was a variety of music, dancing, and lots of local vendors selling hand made goods. Many of us stayed over the weekend to tour. We visited La Antiqua the first home of Hernan Cortez and the city of Cempolala inhabited by the Aztecs which now has the ruins of ancient temples.

Another wonderful fulfilling experience we had. It is always exciting working with Habitat. Meeting so many different people with the same common goals to help others in need is always refreshing. You can learn more about Habitat for Humanity by logging into their website at www.habitatforhumanity.org.