Raising The Roof On UC s Habitat For Humanity Project

Janie Cunningham’s future home is taking on a familiar look as construction continues on the UC/Cincinnati Habitat for Humanity project at 128 Winkler St.  Workers last week started roofing the home with the same zinc material that’s on Tangeman University Center and the Joseph A. Steger Student Life Center.

The materials for the roof were donated and installed by Umicore, the company that manufactured the zinc skin for the MainStreet projects. Not only is the material economical as far as construction goes, but it’s also enduring. Janie Cunningham will never need to plan for the expense of re-roofing her home – the zinc skin will last a lifetime.

Construction on the two-story, three bedroom home got underway in Mt. Auburn in early September. Volunteers from across the university are spending Saturdays working at the site and are expected to wrap up their work sometime in March. Coming up this Saturday, the volunteers will continue their work on the vinyl siding, the basement insulation and interior wall framing, plus work on the ceiling and rails for the front porch.

The UC/Habitat project was also featured at last week’s UC Homecoming Parade. Kurt Ponting, a senior staff engineer for UC Construction Management and a UC/Habitat coordinating committee member, designed a structure to be featured as a float in the Homecoming Parade. Janie Cunningham’s family rode the float down the parade route, along with sister Sylvia Smith and her family, the benefactors of last year’s UC partnership with Cincinnati Habitat for Humanity at 111 Winkler St.

The building that was featured on the float will eventually become a storage shed for Janie Cunningham’s future home.

Construction on the project is overseen by volunteers from UC Construction Management. The UC Center for Community Engagement is coordinating the university volunteers for the project. Fifth Third Bank has contributed $32,000 to fund the project. The remaining half of the funding will be raised by UC.