20 Apr 2015 Special dinner at Vilonia

Todd Owens photos

A special dinner was recently held in Vilonia to celebrate the work being done to help those impacted by the April 27 tornado.

The Vilonia Disaster Recovery Alliance (VDRA), Habitat for Humanity and the Apostolic Christian World Relief (ACWR) have been working together to build new homes and repair others. ACWR volunteers from across the United States came to Vilonia to offer assistance. They put in about 37,000 manhours with 50 to 60 workers each week.

Those who received one of the five new Habitat homes or those who benefitted from repairs were invited to a dinner hosted by the Apostolic Christian volunteers.

About 200 attended the dinner, which includes a program featuring comments from representatives of the three organizations as well as each Habitat home family. “It was real touching,” said VDRA Case Supervisor Sandy Towles. “It was a really good program.”

Towles said the hope is that the Apostolic Christian World Relief will return to Vilonia next year to build more houses.