On October 2nd, Carissa Galgano and Nicholas Simpson (pictured) of Turnkey Compliance Solutions, a Division of Walden Environmental Engineering, attended Rebuilding Together Hartford’s annual Rebuilding Day. Simpson has attended the event each year since 2014 and has served as a group safety coordinator, general volunteer and donation sponsor. He was brought on board due to the involvement with the CT Valley Chapter of the American Society of Safety Professionals.
Every year on the last Saturday of April, Rebuilding Together Hartford joins affiliates across the country to provide free home repairs to low-income homeowners who are elderly, disabled, military veterans, and families with children who are unable to repair their homes themselves. Thousands of community volunteers nationwide fix-up the homes and yards of those in need so that they can live in a safer, more comfortable and pleasant environment. In Hartford, they typically have 500 community volunteers who help around 20 to 25 homeowners every year.
The 2021 event took place in the Parkville area of Hartford, CT. This year due to COVID-19 the numbers were down to seven homes and roughly 150 volunteers. The expectations are that the 2022 rebuilding event will be back to typical numbers. Each year the organization selects a different neighborhood community within the city of Hartford in hopes that it will help people to safely occupy their homes for a long time without worry. The event began at Parkville community school where all of the volunteers met and checked in before a kickoff initiated by WFSB’s Scot Haney and Hartford’s own Mayor Bronin occurred. From there, the preassigned volunteers split up and head to the homes and begin on the preplanned tasks with the supervision of contractors and the organization representatives.
Galgano and Simpson were able to work at the same home and completed tasks such as painting, sheetrock repair, plumbing, storm drain repair, and general trash removal. The bonding within the company and the reward of helping others is of great value to the Turnkey/Walden family and helps build team morale. The gratitude of the homeowners is invaluable as some of them have had these home issues for many years and were physically unable to repair them.
The Turnkey/Walden team will be on the lookout for an increased presence at the 2022 Rebuilding Together Hartford’s event, where we hope to get a group of volunteers to assist with new projects!
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