Saturday: UC Launches Fourth Project with Cincinnati Habitat for Humanity

The University of Cincinnati will formally kick off its fourth university-wide partnership with Cincinnati Habitat for Humanity at a dedication at

10:30 a.m. Saturday, Sept. 30, at the construction site located at 3556 Haven St. in Avondale,

just a couple of houses over from where UC’s third construction project with Cincinnati Habitat for Humanity was completed last spring.

Future homeowner Custodio Muianga, a UC doctoral student in Environmental Health & Occupational Hygiene, will greet volunteers at the ceremony, along with his wife, Edite, and their three children, 8-year-old Maite, 6-year-old Edivale and 1-year-old Marla.

Construction on the Muianga’s new three-bedroom, two-story home first got underway on Sept. 5, when a group of first-year Honors Scholars worked at the site as part of their service-learning English class.

The UC/Cincinnati Habitat for Humanity project is sponsored in partnership with Fifth Third Bank and the Messer Construction Co. In addition, Cincinnati Zoo volunteers will be working at the construction site in November as part of the zoo’s “Community Giving” program. The UC partnership exemplifies the UC|21 Strategic Plan’s goals of forging key partnerships in the community and creating opportunity.

Over the UC academic year, the Muiangas are required to invest at least 500 hours of work into the home they will buy with a 25-year, interest-free mortgage payable to Cincinnati Habitat for Humanity. On the $70,000 home, the mortgage payment amounts to $350 per month.

Cincinnati Habitat for Humanity reports that in the City of Cincinnati, only 38 percent of the city’s families are homeowners, compared with 68 percent nationally. Since its founding in 1986, Cincinnati Habitat for Humanity has partnered with volunteers including UC to build 129 homes in the region.

UC’s first university-wide project with Cincinnati Habitat for Humanity started in 2003 on Winkler Street in Mount Auburn, when volunteers constructed a home for the family of Sylvia Smith. UC’s second community construction project occurred on the same street when volunteers built a home for Sylvia’s sister, Janie Cunningham.