GIVING BACK - A DAY WITH HABITAT FOR HUMANITY
May 1st, 2015
While developing custom designs for contractors throughout the United States and Canada, the engineers at DHC are lucky enough to visit active construction sites on a regular basis. Nonetheless, the Southern California team gained a new level of appreciation for manual labor, when they checked their calculators at the door and put in a hard day’s work for Habitat for Humanity.
The team rolled up bright and early to a series of partially constructed homes in Escondido. The residences are built by a rotating team of volunteers joined by the future homeowners, as has been regular practice in building more than 1 million since Habitat’s inception in 1968.
After a quick orientation and round of engineer jokes from the other volunteers and regulars, the group split up to tackle various tasks. John and Chong joined a team who textured and painted the interior of several houses. The walls and ceilings looked great, but Chong’s new frosted tip hairstyle was by far the most impressive thing painted that day.
Thankfully it was an abnormally cool afternoon in east San Diego, as there was no lack of dirt work to be performed. The drafting duo of Sam and Derek spent the day grading around the new driveway, pulling utility pipe, and commenting on the other employee’s work ethic. In the meantime, Mitch and Jasper excavated a footing and pier, placed rebar, and built forms for a new trash enclosure.
Regardless of title or experience, there were nothing but smiles and good attitudes throughout the day, as the DHC group happily filled the role of job site “grunts”. As the day came to a close, the site was cleaned up for the day, everyone exchanging hugs and high fives, the very dirty and tired group headed home for a very good night’s sleep.
We would like to thank the incredible organization Habitat for Humanity, who made us feel welcome and appreciated throughout the entire process, as well as our very supportive customers who were understanding and encouraging when we closed the offices to volunteer. Also, a big thanks to Robin Ko and Josh Rubero, who organized the events, and the rest of the team at DHC who showed the same level of care and quality on the construction site that they do every day at work in the office.