A three bedroom ranch house, built by Merrill High School’s building construction class over the past two years, was placed on its permanent foundation Friday on Van Buren Street. The first home built under the Bluejay Build Team program, the house will provide affordable housing under the ownership of the Merrill Area Housing Authority.
The Merrill Area Housing Authority (MAHA), Merrill Senior High School and City of Merrill announced The Bluejay Build Team Project in November 2016. This initiative jump started the traditional home build project of the high school Tech Ed building construction class. It had been three years since the Merrill High School building construction class built a house. This partnership puts them on track to build a house every year.
“Our agreement is to provide the funding and facilitation for building a house a year,” MAHA Director Paul Russell said. “Merrill High School is responsible to provide students to build the house and the city is responsible to provide a vacant residential lot for the house.”
The first house actually took two years to construct. Very small building construction classes at the high school – four students the first year and four the next – contributed to the slower pace of construction. The good news, noted Russell, is that 11 students have signed up for the class next year, which should put the program back on track.
MAHA’s investment in the house is expected to be about $100,000 by the time it’s ready for a family to move in, Russell said. This house will be a starting point to help MAHA provide affordable single-family housing that is in demand in Merrill.
“MAHA needs like 50 more homes,” Russell said. “This is a great investment for us. This is here to stay and we have a revenue stream that allows us to invest $100,000 a year into this.”
Russell noted that MAHA has a greater demand for affordable housing in the community than they can satisfy. There are many households on a waiting list for housing, he said.
A family of four is set to move into the Van Buren Street home once it’s ready. The students who worked on the house will be invited to take part in a housewarming ceremony to be held at the end of summer.
For the students, the program provides training and education of skilled trades. All the students who worked on the house this past school year landed paid summer internships with program sponsors.
The sponsor list includes Lincoln Windows, Finishing Touch Signs, Stratford Homes, Hall Drywall, Krueger Plumbing, Wisconsin Building Supply and RTL Electric. They all made commitments to donate time, materials or funding for this program.
MAHA retains ownership of the Bluejay Build Team houses, which will be rented to qualifying families at affordable rates.