Habitat For Humanity Launches Waukesha Build Campaign, Warns Of 'Tightening Tool Shortage'

WAUKESHA — Habitat for Humanity's regional office announced Monday the launch of a Hendricks Foundation-backed building campaign that will construct four homes in the Waukesha area over the next year, kicking off a season organizers say is already straining under a quieter problem: not enough circular saws to go around.

Regional volunteer coordinator Deb Osthoff said sign-ups currently stand at 23 people against a target of 60 needed to hit the monthly build schedule, but her bigger worry heading into November is equipment. Circular saws, rotary hammers and 24-foot extension ladders, she said, are 'increasingly hard to borrow' as fall home projects across the county compete for the same gear.

'We used to be able to call six or seven households and someone always had a spare ladder leaning in the garage,' Osthoff said. 'Now I'm making nine calls and getting maybe two yeses, and one of those is a stepladder that tops out at four feet.'

A spreadsheet of borrowed hammers

Osthoff said the organization now tracks tool availability on a shared spreadsheet, color-coded by return date, after a rotary hammer loaned out for a Thursday pour didn't come back until the following Tuesday. The delay pushed back footings on a build site on the city's west side by four days.

Build site supervisor Randy Tschudy, 58, said he has started asking volunteers at sign-in whether they brought their own ladder before assigning them a task, a question he said used to be reserved for whether someone brought work gloves.

'Gloves I can hand out of the bin,' Tschudy said. 'A 24-footer I cannot hand out of the bin.'

Bulk rental talks underway

To close the gap, Osthoff said the regional office is in early talks with two local equipment suppliers about a bulk-rental agreement that would stock a rotating set of tools at the build site trailer rather than relying on volunteers to bring their own. She declined to name the suppliers while terms are still being worked out, citing an unfinished rate sheet.

In the meantime, the organization has posted a laminated sign-up sheet at the site trailer specifically for tool loans, separate from the volunteer labor sheet. As of Monday afternoon, the tool sheet had four entries: two circular saws, one chop saw, and a wheelbarrow with a slow leak in the tire that the owner noted 'still basically works.'

"A 24-footer I cannot hand out of the bin."

— Randy Tschudy, build site supervisor

Volunteer math

Osthoff said the campaign needs roughly 15 volunteers per Saturday build day to stay on pace for four completed homes by next fall, and that the current 23 sign-ups cover only about two Saturdays' worth of coverage if spread evenly, which she said they will not be, because several volunteers have already requested the same two Saturdays in October for 'personal scheduling reasons' she did not press further on.

She said the office is hosting an informational session next week for anyone interested in signing up, where attendees will be asked, among other intake questions, whether they own a ladder taller than six feet and whether they'd be willing to let it leave their garage for a weekend.

'We're not asking anyone to buy anything,' Osthoff said. 'We're asking people to remember they have a rotary hammer in the first place.'