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 Bishop
Brossert High School of Alexandria has
something for its students who want to give
back to the Northern Kentucky community.
Donna Heim and Suzette Glaab coordinate
student volunteer opportunities with
HONK on a monthly basis. The students help
out with a variety of projects from
painting, cleaning out crawl spaces, tearing
down walls to general cleanup of current
projects.
"Getting involved with HONK makes the
students feel good about themselves and the
community. It makes them feel more a part of
the community," Brossert teacher, Suzette
Glaab said. Suzette Glaab heads Brosserts'
Beta Club, a national organization dedicated
to service, leadership and academic
achievement. One Saturday a month she
schedules 8 to 10 student members of the
Beta Club as HONK volunteers.
 Donna
Heim coordinates volunteer efforts at
Brossert for the Freshman, Sophomore and
Junior classes. Once a year each class
participates in some volunteering activity
with HONK. "HONK is an important cause,
because it serves families and children in
need," Brossert teacher, Donna Heim said.
"It teaches our kids to give back to the
community they're a part of, and hopefully
encourages them to do more."
According to Glaab, "The kids love
volunteering for HONK and say it's a blast,
especially when it involves tearing
something down. The kids talk about their
effort in cleaning out a clogged crawl space
and painting a basement wall and putting
their handprints on it. "
 Bishop
Brossert is a long-time HONK Community
Partner and has provided volunteers for over
15 years.
Thank you
Bishop Brossert.
Toyota Corporate Partner
Toyota Motor
Engineering and Manufacturing North America
 The
founding director, Jack Goeke, initiated the
partnership with Toyota when he sought a
corporate grant for Housing Opportunities of
Northern Kentucky in 1998. Since that time,
Toyota has been a generous corporate grantor
as well as a source of energetic volunteers
for occasional HONK workdays.
In 2003, 2004
and 2005, under the direction of Ms. Carri
Chandler, crews from Toyota graciously and
vigorously provided the labor to do
landscaping at recently completed houses in
Covington. In September 2006, Ms. Chandler
coordinated and helped plan a work day for
Toyota’s new engineers in training. Twenty
five engineers spent a hot September day at
one of HONK’s rehab projects. Some worked
outside, reshaping the grade of the front
yard to divert water from the house and
clearing out the accumulated
 yard
debris. Others worked inside, tearing out
old deteriorated drywall and replacing it.
In June of
2007, Toyota’s Human Resources department
got into the HONK workday act. More than 20
employees from the division spent a Saturday
morning and early afternoon helping to
rehabilitate a house in Ludlow, KY.
Ms. Jana
Martin Kemp, Assistant Project Manager for
Toyota’s External Affairs office planned the
September Engineers in Training Workdays.
Forty six engineers got a break from
PowerPoint presentations and volunteered for
two days at 3 different HONK project sites
in Covington and Newport.
HANK BOEHMER
Church and
school groups make up a large portion of
the volunteers that work on homes for
HONK, but Hank Boehmer is proof that
individuals can make a difference.
Boehmer, now 77 years old, was looking
to remain active after retiring from his
paint business in Covington. He tried
volunteering for Habitat for Humanity
first before starting his work with HONK
Homes.
“Habitat was just starting up in
Covington and at the time was building
one or two houses a year,” Boehmer said.
“Sometimes you would come in scheduled
to do work and be told your services
wouldn’t be needed that day. They would
back us off and we would be wondering
what we would do with our time. That was
kind of frustrating.”
“Some retirees like myself heard about
the HONK program,” he added. “We
volunteered and have been busy ever
since.”
In the roughly ten years he’s spent
volunteering for HONK, Boehmer estimates
he may have worked on close to 100
homes, mostly renovations in the
Covington area. In addition to applying
his skills from his days in the paint
business, volunteering has enabled
Boehmer to pick up a variety of new
skills.
“I’ve become more versatile in terms of
carpentry and drywall and some guys get
into plumbing,” he said. “Sometimes we
teach others and sometimes they teach
us.”
Volunteering has also allowed Boehmer to
meet new people and make friends. He and
Bart Braden, a retired math professor
from Northern Kentucky University, hit
it off shortly after they each began
volunteering.
“We partnered up and always try to
schedule the same,” Boehmer said.
He also gets to meet a variety of people
during the lunches that are served at
the warehouse facilities that allow
workers and volunteers to come together.
Most of all, Boehmer says his volunteer
work allows him to share the good
fortune he’s had in his life with
others.
“For me, I’ve been very blessed in my
life,” he said. “I love to try to
improve on things. You can take an older
home and restore it and take a person
who is struggling and offer a better
living condition. It is a spiritual
thing.”
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