Kanisha Parrish has worked with the Paducah Alliance of Neighbors for several years now, and, through dozens of projects, one stands out.
“The home had been abandoned for years,” she says.
“The owner had been living with his sister for a while because he had nowhere else to go. This was a family home, but it was completely inhabitable.”
“It was not safe; it was not clean. No one could live there.”
Kanisha says that any other person would have looked at the home and said it was not salvageable. She says even she likely would have thought it couldn’t be saved.
But, these people are not Sharon Poat, the executive director of the Paducah Alliance of Neighbors. Kanisha says Sharon is never afraid of a project, and she certainly wasn’t backing down from this one.
“Sharon looked at it and said, ‘We can do this,’ and so I thought ‘okay, we are doing this,’” Kanisha remembers.
So, Kanisha and the teams of volunteers got to work.
“We were literally shoveling out stuff where people had looted and dumped out dresser drawers. There was literally just stuff everywhere. We were just scooping out and dumping for a week,” she says.
For weeks, Kanisha cleaned out, tore out, and began putting the home back together with the help of other staff and local volunteers.
“Slowly but surely. We just kept working and working. It took months and months in between other projects.”
The group would have to wait for funding sources to open up so they could do more. Eventually, they addressed the structural issues–they made sure the systems were working (electrical, plumbing, and heat and air), and they provided basic finishes for the aging home.
“In the end, we made that house safe again. We made it clean again. We made it a home again,” Kanisha says.
“Just knowing that the homeowner could be independent again and live his life in a safe place that was special to him because it was a family home, that was very special to me. I really loved that project.”
Perhaps for Kanisha and the other members of the volunteer teams, board of directors, and staff of the Paducah Alliance of Neighbors (formerly the Midtown Alliance of Neighbors), that project is special because it is a bit metaphorical for the process by which the organization was built.
It all began with something special—not a generational home but a historic neighborhood. When the City of Paducah developed its Fountain Avenue Revitalization Plan in 2007, the group sprung forth to help fulfill that mission through education about homeownership and home rehabilitation projects. In 2008 they began their first rehabilitation project, turning a small rundown house in the Fountain Avenue neighborhood into a home again. This was one of the in-need neighborhood’s first projects.
Quite literally, the group was busy cleaning the mess.
Then, they began working on the structure. They established three key programs aimed at meeting the needs of existing homeowners. 1. The volunteer-led Repair Affair program started in 2009, coordinates volunteer teams to tackle needed home repairs for low-income homeowners. 2. The Emergency Repair Assistance Program, added in 2012, provides skilled contractors to repair and replace major systems that affect the safety of a home, including roofs, HVAC, electrical, and plumbing systems. 3. The FAN Assist program rehab also added in 2012, provides major home rehabilitation projects for existing Fountain Avenue homeowners, with price tags that ranged from $70,000 to $115,000. These larger-scale projects are prioritized by serious need and often have owners who are elderly or disabled.
“The homeowners we work with are on fixed incomes, and they have enough money to meet their basic needs,” Kanisha says. “But, they may not have enough leftover at the end of the month to fix that hole in their roof that may just need a repair, not a whole new roof.”
“Our efforts are meant to keep people in their homes safely.”
With that foundational work in place, it was time to take the project to the next level.
“While the Fountain Avenue Revitalization program inspired our creation and received special attention, we recognized from the beginning that there are many neighborhood redevelopment needs and housing-related needs across Paducah,” Sharon recalls.
So, in 2011, the group expanded its repair programs to homeowners across the City of Paducah.
To date, the numbers for the repair programs alone are quite overwhelming:
Repair Affair – In 11 years, nearly 200 families have been assisted across Paducah.
Emergency Repair Assistance – Since 2012, 75 low-income homeowners have received much-needed help.
FAN Assist – between 2012 and 2018, six low-income homeowners in Fountain Avenue were given major renovations to make their homes safer.
Those numbers might seem like enough. Nearly 300 families in 300 homes with life-changing needs met. But you might recall that Sharon Poat never backs down from a challenge—Sharon never meets a project she isn’t brave enough to face.
“As we, and everyone else, began to look beyond Fountain Avenue, we began to look seriously at what new programs we could offer that would meet a community housing need, build from our current knowledge base, be helpful regardless of where and how the city decides to continue neighborhood revitalization efforts, and provide us with the funds needed to fully sustain the program and help our organization do even more,” she says.
For the answer, they simply looked for the most need.
“The construction of good, quality, turn-key ready housing that is affordable to families qualifying for a mortgage in the $80,000 to $120,000 range meets a serious need anywhere in Paducah,” Sharon says.
Continuing with the group’s core repair programs, they recently developed additional programming aimed at helping working families access the American dream of owning their first home. Construction began in 2020 on three brand new, high-quality, energy-efficient homes for credit-worthy low to moderate-income families.
Janel Tate, chair of the Paducah Alliance of Neighbors, is very excited about the new homeowner projects. But she isn’t alone.
“This program is putting these families, that never in their wildest dreams would have thought that they would ever own a home, into new homes,” she says. “The homeowners are so excited. They want to visit and see the construction progress and make decisions about finishes. They are thankful that their kids are going to have their own rooms to decorate. It’s a beautiful thing to see.”
With more than a decade under its belt, a new brand transition to reflect its bigger mission, and hundreds of completed projects, it might seem like the perfect time to hand over the keys and let the living commence.
But no, not for Sharon Poat and her team.
“In 2021, we will welcome our new homeowners into their first homes, and we will begin construction on three more homes. In years beyond that, we would hope to provide at least 6-8 high-quality well-done homes for income-qualified first-time buyers each year,” she says.
“We, the city, the residents, the neighborhood investors, and the businesses that support them have been very successful in past neighborhood revitalization efforts. There is no reason why we can’t do it again.”
“And again.”
Learn More…Do More
Despite doing as many projects as they can each year, Janel Tate, chair of the Paducah Alliance of Neighbors, says there is still a long waiting list.
“These are people who are in desperate need of help from us, and really the only hold-back of us doing that is funding,” she says. For those who donate, Janel says it’s important to remember that their money is impactful.
“One hundred percent of this stays local. We buy local, we help local, we do local,” she says.
If you’d like to help the Paducah Alliance of Neighbors meet these needs, you can mail donations to 300 Fountain Avenue, Paducah, KY 42001.
“What we are able to do with a dollar is outstanding,” she says. “We work with other non-profits here in town to send volunteers for non-skilled repairs.”
If you or an organization you are a part of would like to volunteer your time to help the Paducah Alliance of Neighbors with much-needed repairs, please visit www.PaducahAllianceofNeighbors.com or emailPaducahAllianceofNeighbors@gmail.com.
If you know of someone who would benefit from services from the Paducah Alliance of Neighbors, applications are simple to complete and can be found at www.PaducahAllianceofNeighbors.com.
The Start of Something Exciting
Former AmeriCorps member and Paducah Alliance of Neighbors administrative assistant Kanisha Parrish believes that their work has unlocked one of the most pressing needs of our community.
“There are a lot of groups who are doing really awesome things in meeting needs for providing food, clothes, and those kinds of basic essentials, but it’s harder to figure out how to meet the basic need of shelter. I think Sharon and Paducah Alliance of Neighbors have figured out the best way to help people stay in their homes and make sure they are providing safe homes for their children or their elderly parents.”
Local leaders from CFSB and FNB Bank have noticed the work that the Paducah Alliance of Neighbors has done to help meet housing needs in our community.
“As a community bank, it is integral that we are involved with helping those people most in need in our communities. Through our partnership with the Paducah Alliance of Neighbors, we are able to see our mission come to life when we assist the Alliance with their programs that make the dreams of first-time homebuyers come true, make living spaces more accessible for an elderly or disabled person, or bring a homeowner’s decaying property back to life. Without the Alliance’s efforts, these members of our community would not have access to the funds that can transform their living situation and improve their quality of life,” says CFSB Chief Executive Officer Michael Radcliffe.
“Homeownership can be a family’s greatest wealth-gaining achievement, and it’s our goal as a lender and a community bank to help people achieve the American dream of being a homeowner,” says Dawn Followell FNB Bank Mortgage Sales Leader. “Once you become a homeowner, your next step is being able to maintain and sustain that ownership throughout your lifetime. We want our communities to stay vibrant and grow and flourish.”
CFSB and FNB Bank have partnered together with VUE Magazine to bring you this series about the Paducah Alliance of Neighbors and the people it has helped over its first ten years. In the coming months, join us as we visit with some homeowners who have benefitted from the Paducah Alliance of Neighbors’ efforts and hear their stories of hopefulness and inspiration.
