Manatee Key Club and Kiwanis Give Local Family Extreme Home Makeover

BRADENTON – The Manatee High Key Club and the Bradenton Kiwanis Club are making it an extra special holiday season for one lucky Manatee County Family. If you've seen the popular TV show Extreme Makeover Home Edition on ABC. you know the joy that home repair can bring to a family in need or facing difficult circumstances. A few special local students and businesses are now doing the same for a lucky Manatee County family that needed a helping hand.

Key Club Single Service Chair, Mary Elizabeth Woodward says that although the project is ambitious, the rewards far outweigh the work. "No kid shows up just once," she told me. "Once they come for a day and see what we're doing and how worthy of a project this is, they're hooked and they come back every day."

The students have been spending their entire winter break volunteering their labor to the project. With the help of local businesses including NDC Construction, Hampton Painting, Ugarte & Associates Architecture, Jeffcoat Blueprinting, Rices Appliances, N & M Cool Today Air Conditioning, Armstrong Plumbing, Probuild, the YMCA, David S. Reynolds Electric Inc., Scott Paint, Hide-Away Storage, Turner Tree and Landscape, HB Windows & Doors, SS/20 Building Systems, and Manatee Furniture, they have been steadily transforming the well-worn house into a safe and sturdy home.

"Jerry Parrish, who does gang prevention with the YMCA in this neighborhood, knew the family and they are wonderful, hardworking people who just needed a hand," said Woodward. "They were really cramped for space and the home was in need of a lot of repair. We knew it would be an ambitious project, but we were very eager to help out."

The family had been using their carport as sort of a makeshift fourth bedroom. The group pulled the proper permits and are completing a legitimate addition there. They've gutted most of the inside and and given it a new facade. The home will be hard to recognize once the transition is complete. The team is planning to be able to turn the house over on January 1, giving the family a New Year's Day gift they'll never forget.