VALDOSTA —
With a snip of some over-sized wooden scissors, the City of Valdosta took another step in eliminating substandard housing.
Tuesday afternoon, Mayor John Gayle and District 3 Councilmember Joseph “Sonny” Vickers joined with friends and family of Betty Graham whose home on West Gordon Street was recently reconstructed.
“Her previous home was wooden and had steps on the front porch which made it difficult to walk up in her condition,” said niece Ethel Lovett after the ceremony. “This is kind of like ‘Extreme Makeover: Home Edition.’ This is really a blessing and she really deserved it.”
Vickers has been a council member ever since the city decided to make the revitalization of homes a priority in 1987.
“We’re a long ways from where we used to be,” said Vickers. “We’ve demolished thousands of homes and rehabilitated hundreds of homes. It’s an on-going project that we have dedicated ourselves to.”
Since the program began, he estimates that about 50 houses have been built in his district.
During the ceremony, Gayle handed Graham a Valdosta keychain for the keys to her new home, which was painted white with blue trim and was surrounded by a well-landscaped yard.
Members of the Martin Luther King Jr. Committee donated about $1,200 for the landscape project. Members of the community and Moody Air Force Base volunteered to provide the labor.
Gayle, Vickers and Graham struggled with cutting the ribbon for almost a minute. Gayle offered his pocket knife to solve the problem, but Public Relations Officer Sementha Mathews grabbed one of the construction worker’s boxcutter and gave the ribbon cutting a head start.
The home is located in one of the city’s Designated Revitalization Areas and was reconstructed in partnership with the Valdosta-Lowndes County Habitat for Humanity utilizing Community Development Block Grant funds.
City Council hopes to eliminate substandard housing in the city limits by the year 2020.
Rehabilitation Coordinator Richard Joyner said there is currently one other active project and four projects that are in the final stages of approval.
“It’s amazing to me that these people are so proud of these homes when they get them and that’s what makes it worthwhile,” said Gayle afterwards. “Of course, Valdosta is like a lot of other communities and we’re getting a lot of dilapidated houses and we’ve got to work to keep those from totally taking over. The less substandard houses we have, the better off we’ll be.”
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