by Nicte Hernandez
Leanna Pebley, a 2018 Community Housing Improvement Program (CHIP) client, became a homeowner in March by helping in the construction of her new five-bedroom Orland house. “It is such an amazing feeling to have been a part of the construction of my home,” Pebley said.
“Whenever people are all, ‘Oh Leanna, you own a home now?’, it’s nice to say, ‘Oh, yea, we built it,’” Pebley said.
CHIP started as a partnership between Chico State and the city of Chico to help improve a small neighborhood south of campus through a housing rehab program. Since then, the nonprofit has expanded to serve seven counties including Butte, Glenn and Tehama. CHIP now assists low-income families, helping people who might otherwise lack the financial resources become homeowners through what it calls its “sweat equity” program and by providing rental and farm worker housing.