By Aidan Mortensen | KOAL News

As the housing market becomes increasingly treacherous to navigate, some homeowners may find themselves in situations where repairs and other renovations seem out of reach. This is where the Fuller Center for Housing steps in.

Originally founded as Habitat for Humanity in 1976, the organization changed its name in 2005, becoming the Fuller Center for Housing. Serving the Castle Country, the organization describes itself as a “grassroots affordable housing ministry that builds and repairs homes in Carbon and Emery counties.”

To discuss the organization and its objectives, the KOAL newsroom was joined by Bruce Bean for an insider’s perspective on the Fuller Center.

“I had my eyes opened when I went to a national conference in training about a month ago, and we have a board here in Price, and it’s called the Castle Country Fuller Center,” explained Bean. “It’s helping people get into housing or stay in the housing they’re in with no-interest loans. They pay what they can pay, and that’s the essence of it; it’s a targeted way to have service by people, and then people who can receive the recipients of that service.”

This pay-as-you-can model sits at the core of everything the Fuller Center does. In these projects, recipients are expected to provide ‘sweat equity’ to the project and the volunteers assisting them. “So far this year, we’ve done 16 projects, 16 different homes, anywhere from a ramp on the outside of the home for someone who just came from an accident or they’re at the point now in their lives where they can’t get around, older in life, et cetera. However, some of the sweat equity we’ve had, we’ve had kids from a young family who need some help because their windows are not very good. So we’ve replaced the windows. Some of this work has to be done by contractors. But you see the kids there who are, let’s say, painting. They’re also scraping the outside of the house with some of the volunteers. The people are doing that.”

Bean continued,” But on the other end, we’ve had some disabled folks who really can’t afford much at all. So we work that out with them. One lady, her sweat equity, was making sure the volunteers had some ice water. So that sweat equity, it helps them because it’s not just charity.”

The center offers a wide range of services to help the residents of the Castle Country. Whether it’s reroofing, winterizing a home, siding repairs, window replacements or adding exterior ramps, the Fuller Center does a bit of everything to aid those in need.

To illustrate this point, Bean shared a few stories of how the Fuller Center has impacted the area’s residents with the assistance of outside groups. “Last spring, we had a biking group come in. These are actually bicyclers. They started in the Midwest. And before they came to Carbon County, they were in Colorado. They biked up and over, and they had a group that followed them with signs and vans.” He continued,” But they showed up to a house and they replaced siding, they replaced trim, re-caulked windows, they even fixed the cement steps coming up. And we learned quickly to stay out of their way, because they knew what they were doing. And this was a Fuller Center group. But there were even contractors with this group. And basically, we just fed them and watered them and kept that going. But it was fun being part of that.”

Bean recounted another moment where a local group had stepped up to assist in a project. “I have to give a shoutout to USU Eastern, Coach Chelsea Warburton and the women’s USU Eastern basketball team. The whole team came, and we got a lady’s yard ready so she could put down rock. We got rid of everything. I mean, it was just, there wasn’t anything. Nothing was growing. We even had a couple of the local LDS Church wards come in and were able to run a skid steer for us. That’s the stuff that you just sit back and go, that’s awesome.”

The Fuller Center does all of this without the assistance of any government funds. The organization instead relies on donations and fundraisers to provide its services. One such fundraiser will be held on Saturday, Aug. 2, as they host their annual golf tournament.

“Every tournament I’ve been involved with has a purpose. And this is the same way. Last year, I believe, I can’t remember exactly what we made off it, but it goes right to the Fuller Center,” said Bean of the tournament. “We’ve already reached out to so many businesses and people to sponsor a team. And if you golf, we have a couple of sponsors, and we need people to fill those sponsorships. If you’re interested in playing, we’ll be in touch with you. But also, we’ve had so many people and businesses willing to sponsor a hole. They’re out there building their business, and at the same time, that’s a draw for us.”

Changing gears, Bean described what people can expect when the Fuller Center takes on a project. “It is based upon income. And we use the low-income statute for Carbon County and or Utah. And if they qualify, I don’t know if we’ve even said no to anybody. If they qualify, we say, ‘OK, let’s do this.’ We’ve put in water heaters. We’ve installed furnaces and air conditioners, and we have professionals come in to do that. And then, once we get the ball rolling, so to speak, we put them on a payback. And that goes right back into the Fuller Center’s funding.”

Bean added,” So if it’s $25 a month, if it’s $100 a month, what they can do, that’s what we do. No interest. And so far in the year and a half I’ve been involved with close to 25 to 30 projects or more, we haven’t had one person default.”

For those in need of a project, the application process is simple. Either call 637-9701 or send an email to castlecountryfullercenter@gmail.com. In-person options are also available at the Fuller Center’s office located at 90 West 100 N, Suite 5, in Price.

“If there is any low-income, elderly, disabled, veterans or even a young couple who’s like, wait a minute, we have a new baby, and our house, we need some help making sure it’s safe. We can do that. And I want to just say it’s quite an easy process.”

More information on the Castle Country Fuller Center is available online at fullercenter.org/castle-country/.