For rural Haitian families living in poverty, a typical house is made of mud, sticks, scraps of metal and plastic. In these crumbling shelters, the roof leaks when it rains, the dirt floor turns to mud, and the people living inside are vulnerable to sickness.
That’s why Cross Catholic Outreach partners with the Kobonal Haiti Mission to build safe homes. The mission has been blessing families in Haiti for over three decades with safe shelter, clean water, Catholic education, nutritious food and medical care along with self-help programs such as agricultural training.
The mission’s housing program has been particularly successful, carefully refining its approach over the years to build sturdier houses and utilize resources more efficiently. Leaders within the Kobonal Haiti Mission know the well-being of each community is directly related to the strength of local families.
It made sense to give families a safe place to share meals, build relationships, make memories and pass down their faith to their children. The local Catholic leaders who oversee the housing program are also committed to learning ways to build homes more efficiently. This means evaluating each step of the process and making improvements whenever possible.
Since the Kobonal Haiti Mission’s housing program began, the team prioritized delivering the best homes possible to the families they serve. The mission started out by building wooden homes with tin roofs — a tremendous improvement over the mud and stick houses typically inhabited by poor families.
But the mission didn’t stop there.
As the program continued to grow, so did the quality of the homes, and by the time Cross Catholic Outreach began partnering with the mission in 2003, more durable construction materials like concrete blocks were used instead of wood.
Today, these four-room homes include a galvanized steel roof, solar-powered electricity, a lockable door and an outdoor latrine.
Along the way, the ministry has learned important lessons that have helped them become one of Cross Catholic Outreach’s most trusted housing partners. Here are five things the Kobonal Haiti Mission has learned along the way:
A solid roof makes a huge difference. Originally, the Kobonal Haiti Mission’s homes had tin roofs, a dramatic upgrade from thatched roofs found throughout villages in Haiti.
In 2013, in partnership with Cross Catholic Outreach, the mission upgraded roofs to thicker galvanized steel. This roofing material has a special zinc coating added during the manufacturing process that protects and prevents the steel from rust and corrosion.
The mission also upgraded the quality of the roof frames, switching to a more durable treated wood. This simple change has added years of life to the average roof, preventing rotting, mold and splintering.
Many families in rural Haiti don’t have access to electricity and live off the grid. That’s why solar power has been such an exciting upgrade to the Kobonal Haiti Mission’s new homes. In 2020, the mission began installing solar panels in newly constructed houses, giving families indoor electricity for the first time. This is a dream come true for poor families!
This upgrade gives children the opportunity to study after dark, and families can also charge small battery-powered devices. This is a much safer alternative than candles, which increase the risk of fires and other accidents.
Every home needs periodic repairs to keep the family inside safe and sound. That’s why, after over three decades of building homes in the Diocese of Hinche, the Kobonal Haiti Mission has a solid plan for ensuring past beneficiaries are able to maintain and upgrade their homes.
Making necessary repairs is also the mission’s way of protecting donors’ previous investment in the homes they sponsored many years ago. The most common repairs are roof and frame replacement, door and window repair, wall patching, and repainting walls.
The mission has learned that families take more pride in their homes when participating in the construction process. For this reason, beneficiaries are required to help with initial construction and ongoing repairs.
Families are expected to level the land before the foundation is laid and assist mission staff with any other work such as carrying bricks or other materials. They also dig the hole for their outdoor latrine and are responsible for painting the inside of their new home. This work reduces labor costs and allows families to live in a quality house that they can truly call their own.
When neighbors hear that a new home is going to be built, many of them come to the construction site to help out. That’s the beauty of the mission’s work — it has built an environment where people want the best for each other and serve with the joy of Christ.
Kobonal Haiti Mission homes are a model of quality and efficiency. Believe it or not, they only take five days to build!
This incredible feat is only possible because mission staff have refined their homebuilding process over the years. The mission has also invested in equipment and employs a staff of experienced masons and carpenters who have developed an efficient construction plan.
Here’s the plan the construction team follows to build a home from the ground up:
The Kobonal Haiti Mission has followed God’s blueprint for success, growing its housing program into a thriving ministry that’s changing the lives of Haiti’s poorest families. Kobonal homes are built to last, giving the poor a fresh start, a solid foundation and a place to rebuild their lives.
Each home is a priceless gift to families who have lived in extreme poverty for so long — and right now, many families in Haiti pray that they, too, will one day receive a safe, sturdy home. U.S. Catholics are encouraged to join this important effort to help our brothers and sisters in the Diocese of Hinche build better lives.
Donations from this campaign will be used to cover any expenditures for this project incurred through June 30, 2027, the close of our ministry’s fiscal year. In the event that more funds are raised than needed to fully fund the project, the excess funds, if any, will be used to meet the most urgent needs of the ministry.