Affiliate History

Habitat for Humanity of Seneca County, Inc., began with a meeting in October of 1998 at the Varick United Methodist Church.

A variety of community residents, many of whom learned about the meeting at their church, met and began the process of forming an affiliate to serve Seneca County.

Seneca County is a rural county of 32,000 people in the Finger Lakes region of New York State. The local economy, once based on manufacturing and government institutions (an Army base and a large state psychiatric hospital) has changed dramatically and the county has increasingly become a bedroom community with a large percentage of local jobs being in the service sector.

During the spring and summer of 1999 the Affiliate Application was prepared. The 130-page document was completed and sent for review in early September. On Nov. 1, 1999, the affiliate was approved.

Since then we have worked with five families to build or renovate homes:

1. On June 10, 2000, we broke ground for the affiliate's first home, in Seneca Falls. It was dedicated Dec. 2, 2000.
2. The second project was the rehabilitation of a one-story home in Ovid. Work actually started before the Seneca Falls home was finished, and the house was finished in the fall of 2001.
3. In June of 2002 we started a new home on Black Brook Road in Tyre, which was sold in June of 2003.
4. In June of 2003 we started work on a new home in the village of Interlaken; it was completed in August of 2004.
5. In September of 2006 we started renovating a home on Wycliffe Road in Waterloo. It was completed in June of 2007.

Pictures and other information about all these events are available in the Archive here on the web site.

Officers:

Gerald Graziano, President [president@habitatseneca.org]	Robert Heieck, Vice President [vicepresident@habitatseneca.org]
Bonnie Morlang, Treasurer [treasurer@habitatseneca.org]	Tammy Scherbyn, Secretary [secretary@habitatseneca.org]

Board members:

Menzo Case	Robert Feindt	Sandra Ferrara
Gerald Graziano	Robert Heieck	Neil LeRoux
Todd Martin	David Mayne	Bonnie Morlang
Sharlene Struzyk	Nancy Wayne	Tim Warren
Richard Wood	Tammy Scherbyn	Robert Bucklin
Larry Spencer	Lou Ferrara

Committee Chairs:

Site Selection Robert Heieck	Family Selection Robert Heieck
Church Relations Gerald Graziano	Construction Lou Ferrara
Family Partnership Larry Spencer	Executive Committee Nancy Wayne
Public Relations Todd Martin	Fund Raising Sandy Ferrara