MPCC’s Ogallala campus works to build tiny home community for veterans

NORTH PLATTE, Neb. (KNOP) - In October of 2024, the Mid-Plains Community College Ogallala campus' Ready-to-Work: Building Construction Homes for Heroes program received a funding boost to go toward the tiny home community.

The residents of the tiny homes will be veterans who have experienced homelessness with a focus on the harder-to-house populations.

Ogallala High School seniors, Barrett Renfro and Hailey Tolander, said that working on the tiny houses gives them the chance to look into the construction field.

“We’re gaining more knowledge and experience in the field in case it’s something we decide to go into,” Tolander said.

Executive director of The Connection homeless shelter, Ashley Lewis, said that there will be eight buildings total, seven units and a laundry house.

“We are working on getting asbestos removal done at the apartments that are currently located where these tiny homes will be placed. Once that’s done, we will get moving forward with demolition. From there, we have plans for infrastructure improvements and the foundations so we can get them set down,” Lewis said.

Ogallala campus administrator for MPCC, Mary Pierce, mentioned that MPCC is always accepting high school students that feel they could benefit from the Ready-to-Work construction project.

“When this program started last year, the goal was to offer high school students skills. Not every high school student is going to go on to college, but we believe that every high school student needs to graduate with some skills. We recruited Casey Craig who has a really great business here in town to be our instructor. Our goal is to teach students marketable skills,” Pierce said.

Craig, building construction instructor, said that having a project with an end-goal is especially motivating throughout the construction process.

“In the process of doing this construction for the tiny homes for The Connection in North Platte, we were trying to teach the kids a variety of basic construction skills. With this structure, it’s a lot of framing, siding, windows and interior finish work,” Craig said. “They did work with a plumber and an electrician to learn some of those skills as well. It’s basically just to get them to have the basic skills to be able to go be a benefit to a trade company that they hopefully want to work for.”

You can reach out to Lewis at The Connection homeless shelter if you would like to contribute to the project.