Over twenty years ago, our church partnered with Mt. Zion UMC (now New Vision UMC), and founded the Shalom Coalition to work with Cincinnati Habitat for Humanity building houses in the Walnut Hills area of Cincinnati. In 2015 we will be building our 20th Habitat house. Our church has provided both volunteers and significant funding for these houses. Our church’s Community Ministries & Global Outreach Ministry Team is recommending that our church makes a one time donation of $25,000 in recognition of this being our 20th Habitat house. At the same time we want to use this significant accomplishment to honor two of our church members:
Bob Edgecomb, who has been involved with the first nineteen of the Shalom Habitat houses. Bob started as a volunteer construction leader for the Shalom Habitat Coalition, but for the majority of these houses he has served as a Construction Manager for Cincinnati Habitat for Humanity. Bob recently retired from that position.
Carolyn Moseley, who is stepping down at the end 2015 after serving as the leader of the Shalom Coalition for over twenty-one years spanning construction of all twenty houses.
Looking back, our church took the leading role as we formed the Shalom Habitat Coalition. For the first four or five houses HPCUMC provided most of the funding ($15,000-$40,000 per house) and also the majority of the volunteers. We had a data base that listed well over 200 volunteers from HPCUMC. As more churches joined the Shalom Coalition our participation dropped off both in funding and volunteers. As we finished the 19th Shalom Coalition in 2014 only a few volunteers were from HPCUMC. An interesting note, in the last twenty years the cost to build a Habitat house has increased from about $50,000 to over $90,000 in 2015.
The Shalom Habitat Coalition is in the process of a reorganization but will continue. There is no doubt that Hyde Park Community UMC will
continue be an active member of this coalition to partner with Habitat for Humanity Greater Cincinnati to build houses for low-income families in Cincinnati. This year we will be appealing to our congregation to help us raise the additional $20,000 for the Shalom Habitat House XX.
Lon Kaylor