ESTEVAN - Habitat for Humanity Saskatchewan, which oversees Estevan's chapter, is hoping that 2023 will bring good news for families needing their support in the Energy City and across the province.
The last build completed by Estevan's Habitat for Humanity chapter welcomed the Lewis-Boreski family into their new home in 2020. No new projects have been started in Estevan since then, but the plan is to get things moving in 2023.
Denis Perrault, the CEO of Habitat for Humanity Saskatchewan, provided the update on the organization's changes, news and future plans.
"In January 2021, we went through a three-way merger, to create the provincial enterprise, Saskatoon, Prince Albert and Regina merged. And the outcome is Habitat for Humanity Saskatchewan. Estevan was a chapter of Regina, and now it's a chapter of Habitat Saskatchewan," Perrault explained.
While hit by the COVID-19 pandemic, like everyone else, Habitat, due to the nature of an organization that helps families build their homes, also was hit hard by the rising building prices, the shortage of materials, and also a lack of available volunteers.
In 2021-22, they wrapped up all of their existing builds across the province. And currently, together with their provincial board of directors, all chapters are looking at a build plan for 2023.
"It'll be a provincial build plan. At present, we do not have any builds lined up for 2023 that we can discuss," Perrault said. "It is our intention, of course, to continue to build and we're hopeful that come next year, the availability and the pricing of materials will be a little bit more attractive to Habitat."
Habitat for Humanity works with qualifying partner families, who have to put in 500 volunteer hours in exchange for a home for zero per cent interest, zero down. The families sign a mortgage with Habitat and pay the organization much like they would with a bank.
"We found that this model allows families to get a hand up instead of a handout and ultimately elevates the family and their children. And hopefully, that home ownership model gets people to a better state, something we're very proud of," Perrault said. "Here in Saskatchewan, we've got 200 current mortgages with partner families across the province, including Estevan, and we look forward to building more in 2023 and beyond."
The hope is the plans will be in place in April-June 2023, and then they'll be able to partner with new families and move forward. In the meantime, Perrault noted they were happy to have gone through the merger together with the affiliates and the chapters, and they are excited for the future of Habitat.
Come 2023, the Estevan chapter will be working together with the provincial entity to decide on their further steps. In order to be successful, they will continue to need volunteers, sponsors and community support.
"We're very grateful for the partnership we've had with Estevan for a lot of years and look forward again to building province-wide," Perrault said.
He added that through the merger they've never stopped building and partnering on existing projects. But due to the above-mentioned challenges, they didn't start any builds in 2022.
"We're looking forward to 2023 to be able to start new builds. And we'll continue to work with our chapters, as well as with the communities across Saskatchewan," Perrault said.
"The housing continuum in Saskatchewan has many different facets to it all the way from rentals, of course, to homeownership. And what we're offering is a very small sliver within that housing continuum. We're offering currently 200 mortgages to partner families. And we're hoping to be able to expand that in the future because we see this model working. It works long-term, and it allows true homeownership for families that would not have otherwise had a chance to do so. So, this model is something that we're very proud of."
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