AmeriCares Volunteers Take On Two Projects In Newtown

Scores of volunteers lent a hand Saturday, May 6, in the local component of the regionwide AmeriCares HomeFront Day 2000 project, donating their skills to renovate two houses in need of repair in the Riverside section of Sandy Hook.

Volunteers from Kendro Laboratory Products of Newtown and from the Unitarian Universalist Society of West Redding combined efforts to make many improvements to the Alpine Drive residence of Helena Northrop. George Bouclier, a  Kendro engineer, served as the house captain for the project.

Volunteer workers from the Newtown Lions Club and the Rotary Club of Newtown pitched in and made extensive repairs at an elderly woman’s home off Hemlock Trail. Gary Fetzer of the Rotary Club was house captain on the project.

“AmeriCares’ goal is warm, safe, and dry,” Mr Bouclier said of the group’s intent in undertaking the more than 130 home renovation projects that weekend throughout Connecticut and Westchester County, N.Y.

The New Canaan-based AmeriCares Foundation is a private, non-profit disaster relief and humanitarian aid organization.

Besides the labor donated by volunteers and tradesmen, many area firms donated services and products to AmeriCares for the home renovation projects.

Dozens of volunteers worked on improving the Northrop residence, applying paint, repairing holes, fitting lumber, and fixing electrical problems. A door was installed and gutters hung.

“We try to pull from the community, whatever people can do,” Mr Bouclier said as volunteers toiled nearby. He estimated the Northrop project involved $3,000 of donated materials and $6,000 of donated labor.

 Ms Northrop expressed thanks to the volunteers who scurried about her yard, tidying up the premises.

“What they’re doing in a few hours would take me a month or more,” she said. “They’re making it safe, clean, and dry,” she said.

 Mr Fetzer supervised a work crew at an isolated home on a steep slope off Hemlock Trail, perched well above nearby Interstate-84.

Volunteers installed a new deck, did roofing, applied paint, did flooring, improved a bathroom, installed a countertop, placed drywall, did window work, and put in new doors.

Mr Fetzer estimated that $1,500 of donated building materials were used at the Hemlock Trail project. 

The complexity of the project was compounded by difficult access to the site up a steep, switchback driveway, which required a large amount of demolition debris to be hauled down the driveway by hand to a dumpster.

Members of the Newtown Congregational Church participated in a renovation project in Danbury.

The AmeriCares HomeFront program is intended to improve the premises of selected low-income, elderly, and handicapped homeowners.