EVERETT – The construction company that has been ripping up bridges and diverting traffic in Everett since last September will be welcomed with open arms and fresh coffeecake at an Everett woman’s home this morning.
Gerda Wingerning Braaten, 91, spent Friday baking, using recipes from her native Germany, for the dozens of Atkinson-CH2M Hill construction workers who will descend upon her Baker Avenue home.
In exchange, by the end of today, she can expect a repaved sidewalk, a new kitchen stove and porch railings. Her fence will get a fresh coat of paint, and flowering plants, donated by Atkinson employees, will be added to her garden.
“Some were already here,” Braaten said Friday as she emerged from her kitchen, her hands covered in sugary dough. “They wanted to start early.”
Atkinson got Braaten’s name from Rebuilding Together, a national nonprofit organization that arranges home repairs for low-income and disabled people. Companies choose local residents from a pool of applicants gathered by Rebuilding Together. They spend one day sprucing up their homes, even performing major renovations and landscaping. The work is done at no cost to the resident.
Today, 20 different Seattle-area companies will do work on 28 different homes. Performance Nissan KIA, an Everett car dealership, is sponsoring repairs on two homes, one in Everett and one in Mukilteo.
The average retail value of the home repairs is about $6,000, Rebuilding Together Seattle director Jody Rogers said, but Atkinson’s project at Braaten’s home will be worth much more. Atkinson has construction resources and skills in-house, while other sponsor companies find work donors or hire construction crews.
Several of Atkinson’s subcontractors will donate materials and services for the work at Braaten’s home.
For Atkinson employees, the day is a chance to work on a project with immediate results, unlike the three-year I-5 expansion project that has frustrated drivers and residents living under the shadows of cranes and bulldozers.
In 2008, drivers will have a carpool lane along Everett’s stretch of I-5, and residents who live along certain stretches of the freeway will have noise walls to shelter them from the rumble of traffic.
Until then, there will be orange construction cones, lane closures and traffic backups.
But Braaten, who will preside over the work today from behind horn-rimmed glasses, will rest easy in an updated home.
Reporter Krista J. Kapralos: 425-339-3422 or kkapralos@heraldnet.com.
Talk to us
> Give us your news tips.
> Send us a letter to the editor.
> More Herald contact information.
