Daily Independent (Ashland, KY)

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May 22, 2011

Repair Affair draws small army of volunteers

Kenneth Hart The Independent

ASHLAND — A small army of volunteers fanned out across the city on Saturday.

Their mission? To tackle various home-repair and improvement projects for low-income, disabled and elderly residents

The 2011 edition of Ashland’s Repair Affair drew about 250 volunteers, who tackled about 45 different projects, said Mike Miller, Ashland’s director of planning and community development and coordinator of the event.

Projects ranged from general sprucing-up tasks such as yard work and painting to more involved tasks like roofing and building handicapped-access ramps.

Well over half the jobs were completed by lunchtime and Miller said he anticipated they would all be done by late afternoon. He said the entire process had gone smoothly.

“This is our 11th year,” he said. “We feel pretty confident about what we’re doing.”

Including this year’s job, about 550 projects have been completed since Repair Affair began in 2000. The program started with a three-year matching grant from the Kentucky Housing Corp., but has become mostly self-sufficient, Miller said. A number of businesses and individuals donate materials and supplies, or sell them at deep discounts. The city budgets $5,000 to $10,000 for the program each year and also provides in-kind services, such as the use of its trucks, tools and workers.

One of the younger volunteers for this year’s Repair Affair was 15-year-old Erik Gaynor of Bellefonte. The Huntington St. Joseph High School sophomore said he was participating in the program as part of a Boy Scout project.

Gaynor said during his lunch break that he’d been working since 7:30 a.m and that he’d performed a number of tasks, including scraping old, peeling paint off a shed and lugging sacks of concrete. He said he was enjoying himself, but he also admitted he was “a little bit tired.”

Gaynor also said it gave him a good feeling to help out homeowners in need of assistance.  

One of the large projects of this year’s Repair Affair took place at a home in the 270 block of Chinn Street. Volunteers working there tore down a dilapidated old roof over the house’s rear deck.

In so doing, they likely saved the deck itself. The roof was badly rotted and likely would’ve collapsed eventually taken the entire deck with it, said James Bradshaw of Worthington, who was heading up a crew from Bridges Christian Church in Russell.

“It (the roof) was just about ready to fall over,” he said.

Workers also did some landscaping and painting at the residence and laid down some roll roofing material on the back side of the house’s roof.

Bradshaw said he had participated in Repair Affair for the past six or seven years always enjoyed doing so.

“It’s just a good way to give back to the community and help people who are in need,” he said.

KENNETH HART can be reached at khart@dailyindependent.com or (606) 326-2654.

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