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Valley carpentry students building nine homes in nine-day 'blitz'

Brad Bryant is the president of the Augusta Home Builders Association and teaches carpentry at the Valley Career & Technical Center in Fishersville. He's leading a "build blitz" to construct nine homes in nine days and donate most of them to community organizations.
Community Foundation of the Central Blue Ridge
Brad Bryant is the president of the Augusta Home Builders Association and teaches carpentry at the Valley Career & Technical Center in Fishersville. He's leading a "build blitz" to construct nine homes in nine days and donate most of them to community organizations.

This weekend, local contractors and carpentry students will kick off a "Build Blitz." The goal is to construct nine homes in nine days to benefit people facing homelessness. WMRA's Randi B. Hagi reports.

On Saturday morning, a bell will ring, and construction crews will start framing nine houses at Valley Career & Technical Center in Fishersville. This is the second "Build Blitz" organized by Brad Bryant, a carpentry instructor at the school and president of the Augusta Home Builders Association.

BRAD BRYANT: I want the students to understand the community giving side of things.

The first "Build Blitz" Bryant organized in 2022, as seen in an aerial photograph.
Brad Bryant
The first "Build Blitz" Bryant organized in 2022, as seen in an aerial photograph.

They've received grants for the blitz from the Home Builders Association of Virginia, the National Association of Home Builders, and other local and state organizations. Manufacturers have provided more than $50,000 of donated materials, including windows and trim. The 14-by-32 foot homes will each have one bedroom and one bath. They're ideal for an accessory dwelling unit or a small cottage village. All next week –

BRYANT: We will put in all the interior facilities, as in getting it ready for rough-in, which would be the electrical, HVAC, plumbing – contractors coming in and working right alongside our students during their class time to get those things done.

Volunteers can register ahead of time to help paint and assemble. Over the second and final weekend, the builders –

BRYANT: As we're jokingly saying, they "trick them out." … They'll start putting some of their styles and their touches, their cabinetry, their wall coverings.

Bryant plans to auction off only as many homes as needed to recoup their costs, and then give the rest away. He's working with a few local organizations to receive the donated homes, with the goal of housing veterans and foster kids aging out of the system.

Randi B. Hagi first joined the WMRA team in 2019 as a freelance reporter. Her work has been featured on NPR and other NPR member stations; in The Harrisonburg Citizen, where she previously served as the assistant editor;The Mennonite; Mennonite World Review; and Eastern Mennonite University's Crossroads magazine.