Thanks to 13 strangers, homes are being built in Honduras

Just three months after a group of 13 strangers from varied backgrounds traveled to San Pedro Sula, Honduras, with Food For The Poor, the group has generated enough donations to build a double-unit home.

The new home funded by the group will be built in the Santa Barbara region later this summer. The group wants to build three more double-unit homes and will need to raise $9,600 to make this dream a reality for three more families in desperate need of sturdy housing.

With many families in the mountain region of Santa Barbara living in makeshift dwellings, the construction of even one home can become a community event. The group experienced happiness after they completed Efigenia Ramirez’s 400-square-foot house in April. Ramirez’s neighbors gathered and clapped with joy when Food For The Poor presented her with the key to a new home for herself and her family of 11.

“When we take groups on a mission trip, it’s primarily for them to meet the people who are benefiting from their generous donations, for them to see for themselves how their gifts in kind and monetary contributions are being put to use,” said Food For The Poor’s Executive Director Angel Aloma. “The fact that the mission group on their first ever ‘Journey of Hope’ to Honduras committed themselves to building homes for the people they met there is truly wonderful.”

Food For The Poor began serving in Honduras in 1999, soon after Hurricane Mitch devastated the Central American country, and has built more than 3,000 homes to date, providing thousands of families with sturdy houses. The concrete block houses are built on a cement foundation and have porches, windows, bathrooms and are topped with a sturdy zinc roof.

Because of the Honduras House Matching Program, Food For The Poor is now able to construct a double-housing unit for each family selected to receive a home. This program was developed to address the critical housing shortage in Honduras. Funds are earmarked for a house matching project, meaning that for each single-unit home that Food For The Poor builds, another single-unit home will be built. Therefore, every $3,200.00 donated will result in the construction of one double-unit home, consisting of two bedrooms, one living room, and a bathroom.

To help with the project, please visit the mission group's Champions For The Poor page.

Chicago-area lawyer Susan O’Neal, who was one of the mission trip participants, recently was featured in an American Bar Association Journal photo.

Food For The Poor, the third-largest international relief and development organization in the nation, does much more than feed millions of hungry poor in 17 countries of the Caribbean and Latin America. This interdenominational Christian agency provides emergency relief assistance, clean water, medicines, educational materials, homes, support for orphans and the aged, skills training and micro-enterprise development assistance, with more than 96 percent of all donations going directly to programs that help the poor.

For more information, please visit www.foodforthepoor.org.

Contact:
Wanda Wright
Food For The Poor
Public Relations
954-427-2222 x 6079
wandaw@foodforthepoor.com