Rebuilding Together Thurston County, a non-profit organization active in the community for 21 years, requested $100,000 in city funding for 2025 to continue serving area residents during a Yelm City Council meeting on Tuesday, Sept. 3.
Jennifer Ferguson, board president of the organization, said 12% of the households, or 46 total homes, served by the organization reside in Yelm. Rebuilding Together Thurston County provides free home repairs and handicap modifications to area residents who are elderly, disabled, families with children and veterans in need. Yelm City Council will use its discretion in whether or not the local businesses that took the podium during the Sept. 3 meeting will receive the funding requested.
“Our motto is repairing homes, revitalizing communities, rebuilding lives,” Ferguson said. “With the City of Yelm, what we’ve found over 20 years is that the repairs requested, we tend to see more repairs requested for households. Those repairs tend to be more expensive due to both the age of the homes, being older than what we see with our typical applicants, along with longer home ownership before they actually get around to requesting help from us.”
She added that the most frequently requested repairs include septic tank pumping, water heater tank replacements, resolving faucet and drain issues, and finding a solution for leaky pipes. Rebuilding Together Thurston County also offers ADA safety modifications, including installations of grab bars, handrails, ADA toilets, wheelchair ramps, tub modifications, stair and deck repairs, flooring to repair or remove trip hazards, and the reparation of damage due to plumbing leaks. It also handles gutter cleaning, siding replacements and roof tune-ups.
“Most of the work is done by over 100 community volunteers who assist us, both unskilled like me who can wield a hammer or a paint brush, and our skilled volunteers,” Ferguson said. “Those who are contractors come to us as plumbers, electricians, builders. We also have more than 20 committed contractors and supply partners. Several of them reside and have businesses here in the City of Yelm.”
Ferguson said the organization’s funding comes from municipal grants from the county and surrounding cities, annual fundraising programs such as “Build-It Breakfast,” and donations from local foundations, tribes or individual donors. It finds applicants through referrals from partners Catholic Community Services, local churches and schools, Community Action Council, veteran service organizations, local contractors, Senior Services for South Sound, South Puget Sound Habitat for Humanity and the United Way of Thurston County.
Ferguson added that Rebuilding Together Thurston County defines success by the number of homes reached with disabled residents, the number of critical home repairs completed, the number of low-income households served, the number of households with veterans served and the total number of seniors served. It has two “very part-time” staff members and pays inspectors to complete site inspections.
“The majority of the budget is assigned to materials, and then paying for those. There’s a lot of volunteer work. Over 5,000 hours were provided in volunteer work last year,” Ferguson said. “We’ve requested a substantial amount, $100,000, the maximum that might be available. This would allow us to serve, we project, seven homes. We will gladly and appreciatively accept anything.”
To learn more about the non-profit organization, visit its website at rebuildingtogethertc.org.
