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Habitat for Humanity Celebrates Sunrise Community

Posted: 4:56 PM Sep 15, 2012
Reporter: Jessica Cunnington

Habitat for Humanity Celebrates Sunrise

September 15, 2012

Habitat for Humanity celebrated a huge accomplishment with a block party on Saturday. They have successfully redeveloped a mobile home community without displacing the residents that live there.

Sunrise Park in Charlottesville is the first location this has been done in the nation.

Habitat promised residents living in the park that they'd be able to stay in the Sunrise community forever and that's when they started building in March 2011. But on Saturday, one resident who lived in her trailer for 32 years is now right next door in her new Sunrise home.

"The first morning I woke up, I thought I was in a hotel because they are so splendid and so beautiful, it just threw me for a loop and I wasn't sure I was really there," Marion Chapman Dudley, a Sunrise Penthouse resident, said.

The block party featured live music, food, and remarks from various community members including Mayor Satyendra Huja. Habitat for Humanity has set its goal of building at least 20 homes annually to transform even more mixed income neighborhoods for Charlottesville.