Macomb Habitat Partners with Baker College

CLINTON TOWNSHIP, MI — Students in the College of Business at Baker College’s Clinton Township campus will have an opportunity to assist Macomb County Habitat for Humanity with its website design, fundraising appeals, electronic media outreach, program design and other programs to help the nonprofit provide housing for needy individuals.

The move of all Macomb Habitat offices to the Baker College campus in early September is part of an aggressive strategic plan. Habitat President and CEO called the plan one of its “boldest moves ever.”

“This will allow the students there to have immediate access to our Homeownership Program opportunities,” Hicks said in a statement.

The partnership builds on the institution-industry-integration concept, a sound way to merge the real-world with the classroom, Dr. Cleamon Moorer, dean of Baker’s College of Business, said, also in the statement.

“College of Business students will have the opportunity to apply their knowledge and skillsets real-time while realizing that they are doing something that truly makes a difference,” he said.

The plan also includes a building move for the Mount Clemens ReStore currently located at 130 N. Groesbeck. Broker Anthony Rubino has listed the property at close to $1.8 million, suggesting that there are few manufacturing buildings of its size in the immediate area for sale.

The sale of the 48,000-square-foot building will prompt Habitat to seek a slightly smaller store in northern Macomb County where the nonprofit hopes to reach residents that have been too far removed to shop often at the current site or from Habitat’s Warren Restore site.

For the past five years, Dawn Drozd, chairwoman of Habitat’s board of directors, and the Habitat staff have been working very hard to alleviate inherited debt and reposition the nonprofit for new opportunities.

Their greatest allies in this venture have been the Community Development Department at Macomb Community Action; the Community Development Department in the city of Warren; and Thrivent Financial.

As they reach new pinnacles and help more motivated low-income residents, Hicks asks the community to do just one thing to help.

“If every Macomb County resident sent us $5, we could remove most of the blight in many areas and make neighborhoods thrive again,” Hicks said. “No handouts — just a hand-up for folks who want a mortgage and a back yard.”

Image courtesy of Macomb County Habitat for Humanity