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A message from our Executive Director:During this unique and crazy year, having a home has never meant more. Now more than ever, our homes became a safe haven, provided shelter from the storm, and gave us hope for a brighter tomorrow. Imagine for a moment that you lost your home, a place of comfort and stability. Or even worse, never had a safe, decent, and affordable place to call home. Please join us in continuing our mission of ensuring everyone has a place to call home by contributing to York Habitat for Humanity. Your donation will continue the work that has built 138 homes and helped more than 700 men, women, and children from low-income families find home ownership in York County. We are thankful for your support, now more than ever. We would not be where we are today without your continued dedication to supporting our mission and we are forever grateful. Yours Truly in Community Service, Tammi Morris Executive Director, York Habitat for Humanity  Even more reason to give in 2020: the CARES ActThe CARES Act Provides Two New Tax Incentives
If you make a donation to York Habitat in 2020 and do not itemize your 2020 taxes, you are eligible to give $300 and receive a full $300 tax break in addition to the standard deduction. Couples are eligible to receive a $600 chari- table income tax deduction. That means your donation is 100% tax deductible! If you itemize your 2020 taxes, your cash contributions can be deducted up to 100% of your adjusted gross income. This 100% limit allows you to reduce your 2020 federal income tax to zero. Please check with your financial advisor to determine how these new tax incentives can benefit you.   The Wells Fargo Foundation has awarded York Habitat for Humanity with a $15,000 grant to build an affordable home in York, PA! Download the press release here: 
 York Habitat for Humanity is currently seeking interns for our up and coming ReStore. We're hoping that with this new involvement opportunity, we can further our organizational commitment to the York County community.
Our power to create long lasting, impactful outcomes through or builds will be further supported by these new positions and the assistance they can bring to our staff. Each intern will work approximately 15 hours a week, with new challenges and experiences to face each day. If you are interested in this opportunity, please send your resume to Kasey Lofties, kasey@yorkhabitat.org. Message from the Executive Director
During the COVID19 crisis in our country we understand that this time can be highly stressful and feel very uncertain! That's why we want to share some of the resources we've made available to assist you with your mortgage payments. If you have any questions, please call us at 717.854.6168 or email us at yhfh@yorkhabitat.org Late Fees York Habitat for Humanity will waive all late payments fees for the month of April and May 2020, if your payment is made by the last day of each month. For those who need it, it will give you a couple of extra weeks to get your tax refunds, corona virus relief payments and start receiving unemployment compensation, if you qualify. Credit Agency Reporting York Habitat will not report late payments to the credit bureaus. You will not be penalized for making late payments in April or May, as long as the payment is made by the end of each month. We understand the loss of income due to COVID19 closures is no fault of your own and want you to be confident, you won't have negative remarks on your credit. Payment Methods Northwest Bank Lobby's are closed until further notice to help prevent incidence of community spread of the Corona-virus. However you can still make your payments at any branch through the drive through. Please check their website to make sure they are open when you intend to make your payment. https://www.northwest.bank/ Hardship Reviews Habitat families who are in good standing (not more than 30 days late, in the month prior to COVID19) can request a hardship review from our team, if you are unable to make your mortgage payment due to loss of income, related to the COVID19 business closures. Support is determined, reviewed and granted on a case by case basis. We encourage you to reach out to us and we'll discuss your individual situation and needs! Please email us at yhfh@yorkhabitat.org Your email will be reviewed and a phone appointment will be scheduled within 48 hours of your request. Foreclosures It is never the desire of York Habitat to foreclose on any family who has purchased a Habitat home. However, borrowers who do not make good faith efforts to bring their mortgage current, who are continually 100 days or more late and those who ignore the attempts and services by staff to help eliminate the delinquency through payment plans and agreements end up in foreclosure. Our history shows that we only file a complaint for foreclosure, when absolutely necessary and all other attempts to communicate successfully have failed. I assure you it brings us no joy having to do so. But as trusted financial stewards of the grants, cash and material donations entrusted to us to build these homes, we cannot allow those who refuse to pay their mortgage to do so indefinitely. Keeping that in mind, York Habitat has honored our Federal and State leaders request to postpone any legal foreclosure action until at least May 1 2020. If you have previously been notified of our intent to foreclose due to severe delinquency, we'd ask you to consider catching up now if you can. The reality is you worked hard for your home, through sweat equity, budgeting sessions, first time home-buyer classes and cleaning up your credit and paying off judgements. Please call our office if you have any questions. Finally, York Habitat for Humanity is committed to assisting you through this difficult time. We pray continually for you and we are only a phone call away, if you need us. All staff is working remotely, but checks messages daily and will return your call ASAP. Our office number is 717.854.6168. In the next few days please be on the lookout for helpful information from our Family Services Department on where you can get assistance with food and other resources if you need them. For more updates follow us on Facebook. Be Safe. Stay Healthy! Blessings, Tammi Dear York Habitat for Humanity Friends,
I am writing to provide another update about the measures York Habitat for Humanity is taking to protect our staff, volunteers and the people we serve during the COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic. The CDC is now asking that group gatherings be limited to less than 10 people. For this reason we are taking additional measures to protect our team and volunteers. These measures are based on recent guidance from Habitat for Humanity International, local, state and federal public health authorities. We are continually monitoring the situation, and our approach may change as new guidance is provided. We appreciate your patience and prayers as we navigate this delicate situation! You are our first priority Public Build Site(s) Update Our build sites are closed to volunteers and partner families for the period of March 16- April 5th, 2020. Your health is our top priority. A notification from our staff will be sent directly to those who are scheduled during this time. We recognize these measures may be disruptive to your plans, but given the change in CDC's guidance about group gatherings, this cancellation is prudent to help reduce the potential for Community Spread. Please know any volunteer group cancelled during this time will be given priority for rescheduling once this pandemic has passed. Your Support is Valuable and Needed Changes to Office Hours & Staffing York Habitat will discontinue face-to-face meetings until further notice. It is our position that the use of tele-conference, email and other forms of virtual communication tools, we can assist in reduction of Community Spread of COVID-19. If you have in person appointments scheduled with any of our staff, they will be in contact with you to reschedule or change the method of the meeting. If you are a program participant, your requirements for Sweat Equity and Monthly Budgeting will be waved for the rest of this month. Any outstanding Committee meetings of the organization must move to conference calls or be conducted via email for the rest of March. Please contact your staff liason for more information. Guidance on April meetings will come at a later date. ReStore Donations York Habitat has many ReStore donation pick-ups scheduled throughout York County for the next several weeks. In order to keep our donors as safe as possible, all pick-ups are being cancelled and will be rescheduled at a later date. We appreciate your patience as we attempt to reduce risk to our community! York Habitat for Humanity will remain open, but will not except walk-ins at this time. The only persons allowed in the Habitat office are staff and Board Members, until further notice. We Are Open for Business, albeit modified, for now! Please know that we are constantly monitoring the situation and will update our plans as new details emerge. Thank you for your continued support as we navigate this public health crisis together. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact us! Thank you and as always we continue to pray for you and our beloved York County Neighbors, Our State, Our Nation and Our World! In partnership, Tammi T Morris From the Executive Director: Tammi Morris
With the arrival of the first positive cases of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) in Pennsylvania and Maryland, I wanted to personally reach out and inform you of the current position York Habitat for Humanity has taken for the safety and health of our team members and volunteers. I, like many of you have attempted to weed through the almost panicked and numerous reports and to balance that with common-science-sense as we move through the next days and weeks! I heard a report recently that said, if we had the same media-coverage and reported on the number of deaths annually from the common flu, as we have seen with the corona virus, the general public would be responding the same way. Many of the concerns are because of the unknowns of this virus. While the fatality numbers are low, any death that can be prevented is sad loss. So it is better to err on the side of caution. Many of you know Habitat is a volunteer driven organization that gathers thousands of people each year at our Habitat build sites and events. Our local affiliate partners with organizations, schools, businesses and churches locally and all across the United States. If you have ever been on a Habitat site you know first hand, we take the health and safety of all our volunteers very seriously. You are precious to us! This is no different than protecting you from a work-site injury, but does require different precautions. NON-LOCAL GROUPS CANCELLED That being said, we have cancelled any planned groups coming from out of the South-Central Pennsylvania Region, for the next thirty days. This is simply a precautionary measure to help ensure we and they are not unknowingly exposed or exposing each other to the virus. Rescheduling will occur for those groups willing and able to do so, at a later date. LOCAL GROUPS NOT CANCELLED Local groups that are currently scheduled will not be cancelled at this time. Our build sites remain open and no changes are being made at this time. As we monitor this situation, we will make changes if deemed necessary. We believe that since these gatherings are generally small with no more than 12-15 people, they present no serious risk to you or your loved ones health if you are not considered at-risk. That said,if you are in a higher risk group with an auto-immune disease, chronic heart or respiratory illnesses or are diabetic, please follow the CDC's recommendation for social distancing. Your health and safety is what matters most to us! Business as Usual The York Habitat for Humanity operations will be business as usual, unless/until a change is deemed necessary and beneficial. We will continue to monitor the national and state health guidance on this matter. From all of us at York Habitat for Humanity, we pray for your continued health and safety. Thank you for all you do to help build safe, affordable,healthy housing to the most vulnerable among us! Please do not hesitate to contact us, if you have any questions! Blessings, Tammi Executive Director
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