PINEVILLE — Bell-Whitley Community Action Agency in Pineville will be holding their annual Repair Affair event on Saturday. The kickoff for the event will be at 8:00 on Saturday at the Bell-Whitley building in Pineville.
Teams will arrive and the kickoff, where there will be refreshments available before leaving to work.
Repair Affair is a one day event where volunteers go out and help elderly or needy home owners with repair work to their homes.
This year the focus of the event is Middlesboro. Many of the homes that will be repaired suffered from flood damage during last years severe storms in June. There is one job site outside of Middlesboro, which is in Arjay. There is total of 14 job sites.
There are currently nearly 300 volunteers signed up to work on Saturday. This includes several churches and businesses across Bell County. There are also two out of town groups that are coming to help. St. Mary’s from Hillsboro, Ohio will have a group present as well as the Mission of Hope from Knoxville, Tennessee.
Volunteers are assigned jobs based on the skill level of the group.
Volunteers will be performing exterior repairs on all the homes. These repairs include: house painting, gutter work, porch painting and repair, yard work, and small deck work.
The volunteers do not do any interior work or roof work. Volunteers will not be replacing any windows either.
Workers will be fed throughout the day with a lunch at noon. All the food and drinks were donated.
Bell-Whitley has been doing this event for over 12 years. The event started with a $1,500 dollar grant from the Kentucky Housing Cooperation over 12 years ago.
Now all the money for the event is gathered through donations. “Every dollar is spent for material for the repair of the homes,” said Norman Cornelius, the director of the event.
Each year the event committee screens applicants based on a set criteria. The applicant has to be 60-years-old or older or have a disability. The applicant must also own their home.
Cornelius said that the committee looks at 25 or 26 homes and then narrows it down to fit the budget. “We never know what our budget is because it’s donated to Bell-Whitley,” said Cornelius.
Cornelius stated that they are still taking donations up until the day of the event. Anyone wanting to make a denotation can send it to Bell County Repair Affair at P.O. Box 159, Pineville, Ky. 40977. The donations count as a tax deductible.
If anyone is wanting to volunteer, they can arrive at the kickoff Saturday morning and fill out a volunteer form or pick up a form at the Bell-Whitley office in Pineville. Anyone under 18 years of age must have a parent sign the form.
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