LIVE OAK >> Creeping flames stopped just 8 feet from Luke Politte and Amber Julien’s front door during the 2020 CZU August Lightning Complex fire. Smoke damage, however, was allowed free rein to tear through their abode.

The family kept company with hundreds of others countywide, displaced from their rented coastal Swanton Road home more than two years ago. For much of the time since, the two, their young son and their two large aging Catahoula leopard dogs, were tucked into a recreational vehicle parked on family members’ property. The couple is on the brink of finally ending the family’s housing insecurity and putting down community roots, however.

The first-time homebuyers, along with new neighbors Eurek Hinds and his 10-year-old son Isaac Hinds, were the latest to see their 500 hours of “sweat equity” pay off in the form of a newly completed Habitat for Humanity Monterey Bay project within the Rodeo Creek Court development in Live Oak. During a celebration Thursday afternoon of the nonprofit’s completion of its 60th home, Politte pledged to continue paying forward his goodwill by volunteering on other homebuilding projects.

“This house created a pathway for us to stay here,” Politte, 46, told an audience of nearly 60 gathered for the occasion. “We were out of a home and we had nowhere to go. We were going to leave and the community was going to lose teachers. This was our light at the end of the tunnel.”

Julien, a 40-year-old teacher at Shoreline Middle School, said she was looking forward to being able to bicycle to work while 9-year-old son Leo Politte. He is already commuting to the nearby Live Oak Elementary School and said he was grateful to those who helped make his new home a reality.

“I used to have to drive a long way to see friends. Now, all I have to do is step out my front door,” Leo said cheerily to applause.

Halfway to completion

The housing development, at 2340 Harper St., sits on a nearly 1.6-acre property tucked most of the way down a narrow dead-end street off Chanticleer Avenue. As part of a state-required dismantling of redevelopment agencies, Santa Cruz County was ordered to dispose of the property, for housing purposes, by 2018. When Habitat for Humanity submitted a proposal to develop the property with a range of affordable-rate homes in 2017, neighbors told their county representatives that their priority concerns included preserving the property’s arroyo habitat and for the project to include adequate on-site parking.

To date, families have moved into four of the development’s planned 11 homes, intended as 10 duplexes and one standalone residence with rooftop solar. At the back of the property, a towering treeline remains visible. Once the remaining details are finalized, the Polittes and Hinds will move in as the development’s fifth and sixth residents.

The development offers eligible residents, restricted to those earning from 50-80% of the area median income, an organic communal garden, open recreational space and a 28-space on-site parking lot. The two-bedroom home prices are estimated to cost homeowners $278,000 and the three-bedroom home prices are about $350,000, with a mandate that no more than 30% of homeowners’ income goes toward mortgage and other housing-related expenses, according to Habitat literature.

The development’s final five homes are on schedule to be completed by April 2024.

Offering a ‘lifeline’

Hinds, the development’s other newest homeowner, said the past five years had taken a toll on him — leaving the single father to wonder how he would find a safe landing for himself and his son. After 23 years living in Santa Cruz County, Hinds said he was willing to jump in feet-first when he found an opportunity to own his own home in an area where the median price for a single-family home runs about $1.2 million.

“I was at a point where I had to decide whether I was going to stay here or whether I was going to pack up and try my luck somewhere else,” said Hinds, who works full-time for Santa Cruz Public Works Department. “I also had this guy (son, Isaac Hinds) to consider, so packing up and going bye-bye wasn’t really an option anymore.”

Hinds happened upon the Habitat opportunity less than 24 hours before an application period closed for the latest openings. He said he spent the night pouring over information videos and filling out forms to make the next day’s cutoff.

“Once I opened Pandora’s Box, I had to go in,” said Hinds, standing in the doorway to his new home during a reporter’s visit Friday.

Hinds, a 50-year-old disabled Navy veteran, said at first, he was reluctant to believe the home might be his. Slowly, as the process became clearer and he became a “construction dad” on his days off, reality began to hit.

“If you are someone who has been handling your business but can’t seem to get over the hurdle because of the circumstances in our county, (Habitat for Humanity is) an excellent option, in my opinion,” Hinds said.

From digging trenches to laying rebar

Santa Cruz Mayor Sonja Brunner was on hand Thursday to commend volunteers among an audience of about 60 people that gathered on Rodeo Creek Court. Brunner, herself, had volunteered on Habitat builds, she said, and — from experience — commiserated that “laying rebar is not an easy task — five hours of it.”

Some 19,000 hours donated by 135 volunteers were used to build the most recent two homes, officials said.

Brunner presented a city of Santa Cruz proclamation, recognizing Habitat for Humanity’s 60th home completion with “Habitat for Humanity Monterey Bay Day” in the city on Thursday. Representatives from development financing partners Community Foundation Santa Cruz County and Housing Trust Silicon Valley, who helped usher in early key funds for the effort, also joined the celebration.

“It really takes all of us working together for solutions like this,” Brunner said.

Habitat Monterey Bay CEO Satish Rishi said that some 55 of their 60 original families remained in their same homes, decades later.

“It’s very overwhelming to see some of these kids who were no taller than this and now they’re in college or they are professionals in their jobs and basically they are standing on their own two feet,” Rishi said. “We help one generation and the next generation helps themselves. That is one of our business models.”

For information about Habitat for Humanity programs, visit habitatmontereybay.com.