South Philly Review

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Anna Johnson currently rents a two-bedroom rowhome on the 1900 block of Latona Street with her husband, brother and daughter, who battles asthma and is confined to a wheelchair. After next week, her family will move three blocks west to a brand new home that caters to her daughter’s physical needs.

Johnson’s family was one of four selected from across the country to participate in Build Smart, Breathe Easier, an asthma educational program, that teamed up with HGTV’s Carter Oosterhouse; Merck — a pharmaceutical company; Habitat for Humanity Philadelphia; and the Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America. The collaborating groups dedicated the residence with asthma-healthy features and wheelchair accessibility to the family Nov. 12.

Located on the 2200 block of Latona Street, the house features hardwood floors, organic compound paint, blinds and advanced framing techniques. All of these factors help to decrease the amount of pollen, dander and other allergens in the dwelling, lower the amount of pollutants that can enter the house and make for easier cleaning.

“This house was built to help my daughter,” Johnson said of 18-year-old Tatiana Henry, who, along with asthma, has physical limitations and a cognitive impairment. “It has taken a huge amount of stress off me and has made a big impact on our lives.”

Johnson; her daughter; brother, Michael Johnson; and husband, Ricardo Henry, have lived in a Point Breeze rowhome with roof and water damage, moldy carpets, poor electrical wiring and cracked walls.

The home’s bathroom and Tatiana’s bedroom were located on the second floor; therefore, Johnson had to carry her up and down the stairs multiple times a day. Tatiana’s room and a bathroom now are conveniently located on the ground floor of their new adobe — that the family is making settlement on next week — along with the kitchen, dining and living rooms. Three smaller bedrooms and an additional bathroom are located upstairs.

Now that the new house has been completed, the family is working on getting Tatiana a motorized wheelchair.

“She’s going to love her new wheelchair,” Johnson said. “But it’s going to tire me out. I can just imagine her whizzing up and down the street with me running after her.”

Johnson’s new residence was the second of four to be built and dedicated as part of the Build Smart program with the first in Detroit in July. A Los Angeles dwelling followed Nov. 15 and the final home is scheduled for this month outside of Atlanta.

Locally the home is one of four on the block that the City’s Redevelopment Authority earmarked for Habitat for Humanity Philadelphia, Habitat’s Director of Development and Communications Corinne O’Connell said. Tamika Henry and her two children, Jakeen and Nakeem, will receive their new home next door to Johnson’s Dec 16, along with two other yet-to-be-determined families as two homes across the street wrap up construction next month.

The organization purchased the former vacant spot where Johnson’s house was built in January and began construction in March with funding from the City’s Office of Housing and Community Development and Merck, O’Connell said.

“This new house will help the Johnsons in many ways,” O’Connell said. “Only 30 percent of their income will go to pay for the house, which gives them more options for health care, childcare and putting food on the table. Also, the quality of life for both Tatiana and her mother will be improved dramatically.”

The money Habitat receives from the family will be used to build more houses for those who meet the group’s criteria — including the ability to pay the mortgage, 350 hours of sweat-equity and need, such as enduring overcrowding, slum conditions or paying too much for rent. The completion of the sweat-equity, which includes time at Habitat construction sites and in the classroom learning about home ownership and financial planning, enables the family to benefit from a zero-interest mortgage.

“So then when they get to the settlement table, they know what they are signing,” O’Connell said of sweat-equity. “They are the most empowered homeowners.”

The Build Smart program was created to bring awareness to people who have asthma and show them that they don’t have to live in an environment that triggers their symptoms, Oosterhouse said.

“What was cool about the program was as a builder, I saw that there were a lot of things people took for granted and didn’t fully understand about improving the quality of their everyday lives,” the host of “Carter Can” and “Red Hot and Green” said. “Take, for example, your washing machine. Some washers go to a high enough temperature to kill dust mites and other allergens, whereas some don’t. You need a washer that not only gets the grass stains out but does the job and kills all of the dust mites.”

The asthma-friendly accommodations include building techniques, materials and ventilation systems based on the foundation’s asthma- and allergy-friendly certification program. The foundation ranks Philadelphia as the ninth most-challenging city for those dealing with asthma while one in 15 Philadelphians suffers from asthma, Dr. Reynold Panettieri, an asthma researcher and University of Pennsylvania professor, said.

“Your indoor environment can trigger the disease and make patients go to the emergency room,” Panettieri said. “The Build Smart, Breathe Easier program looks at ways to get rid of these triggers. Less triggers mean less flare-ups of asthma and less utilization of high dose drugs, which have a lot of side effects. This helps to actively empower the patient and improve their asthma care.”