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Jodi Lundmark, tbnewswatch.com
Habitat for Humanity Thunder Bay CEO Diane Mitchell drops pennies into a washing machine used for the organization's penny collection Monday, May 28.
Last year Habitat for Humanity volunteers put in 11,000 hours helping to build homes in Thunder Bay.
“That’s huge. We can’t do it without volunteers at Habitat,” said CEO Diane Mitchell.
The non-profit organization had Monday, May 28 declared Habitat for Humanity Day in Thunder Bay.
Mitchell said the day is about celebrating the organization’s volunteers, donors and families they’ve been able to help.
“We want to celebrate the donors who donate so many products and so much time to Habitat,” she said.
“We also want to celebrate rebuilding community. We go into the older neighbourhoods, put in a new house and start to rebuild those neighbourhoods,” she added.
This year the organization has two builds on the schedule – a house on Mary Street and another on Home Avenue.
Habitat for Humanity is also still collecting pennies, hoping to accumulate 10 million pennies to build a house in Thunder Bay.
Mitchell said they were hoping to fill an old washing machine full of pennies at their Habitat for Humanity Day barbeque at The Brick Monday.
“We’re not using pennies anymore; you might as well bring them to us,” she said, adding the penny campaign was been successful so far.
“We have 50,000 pennies rolled already. We have thousands more we haven’t rolled yet,” Mitchell said.
Pennies can still be dropped off at the ReStore on Squire Street and anyone looking to volunteer or donate to Habitat for Humanity Thunder Bay can visit www.habitattbay.com.