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Building Communities, and Hope

Builders use their business success to launch charitable efforts that benefit their communities.

By Rob Heselbarth

Charitable efforts include supporting fund-raising events, such as this one for Housing Options, a group in Chicago which provides housing and services to people suffering mental illnesses. Geno Benvenuti, president, Benvenuti and Stein in Evanston, Ill., (center), takes advantage of his businesses’s success by helping those in need.

Donating money is not the only way to make a donation to the community. Dan Packman, president, Design Blue in Newbury Park, Calif. (left), mentors “those in transition” through a nonprofit organization he founded.

Raising money through building or remodeling a home and donating part of the profit is a way to use one’s trade skills to help the community, says Bob Peterson, president, Associates in Building & Design in Fort Collins, Colo. Here, staff from ABD hands over a check to the local Wingshadow organization.

Once a week, Dan Packman (right) meets at a school with local community members looking for help getting back on their feet. Packman’s charitable work takes up about one hour a day, which he says is not much to make a difference where
it counts.

The mentoring process focuses on getting people familiar not just with the task at hand, but with the construction process in general. Packman won’t mentor in a specific trade such as finish carpentry, but instead provides a glimpse of his world including budget, scheduling and consideration of the other people involved. “A lot of these guys are mavericks, autonomous, and don’t want to deal with the system. They have a propensity to be sensitive to other people. I teach that it’s not just you doing your work, but there’s a painter that comes in behind you, and other people in front of you. They must appreciate other trades. It’s about getting them off themselves because they’re very selfish, almost like they are entitled because many things have been taken away from them.”

Peterson chooses to stay local with his charitable work. Some of the national charitable groups don’t get his money, but the local humane society and safe house do. Peterson’s company also donates in-kind work for groups that need help.

One hugely successful project Peterson is proud of began in 1997 when he solicited five partners to buy, remodel and donate a home for charity. “Six of us bought a $200,000 house and turned it into a $500,000 property, and had it sold before it was framed. We also entered it into our local parade of homes, and we got phenomenal mileage out of it. We were able to write a check to United Way for $30,000,” Peterson says.

In 2000 Peterson’s company did it again, but on its own this time. A couple bought a property and wanted to donate the profit to charity. On a $600,000 remodel, Peterson was able to write a $20,000 check to a local charity.

Perhaps a bigger success in terms of growth is the wheelchair ramp program Peterson began. In a few years, more than 50 ramps were designed and built for those in need. Peterson even won an NAHB award for the program. “We started our own 501c3 organization called Building the Future, to protect us from a liability standpoint. We set it up, collect donations when we can, and build up funds for the wheelchair ramp projects,” he says.

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