A Como Park and Jimmy Carter Connection and Reflection

Guest blog by Laura Oyen, Public Funding Coordinator at Twin Cities Habitat for Humanity

On Thursday, January 9, 2025 I spent the morning watching the state funeral for former President Jimmy Carter. Watching this service, I reflected on how this particular person impacted my life, even though I never personally met the man. Jimmy Carter was the first presidential candidate I had an opportunity to vote for in my first election following my 18th birthday. His partnership with wife Rosalynn demonstrates the depth of love two beings can have for one another. Their ability to provide an example of “doing” the work is one that I have always admired.

For the past six years I have worked for the Twin Cities affiliate of Habitat for Humanity (TC Habitat). Habitat is one of the namesake organizations that Rosalynn and Jimmy Carter are probably best known for supporting through their tireless volunteering and activism. Just last year the City of St. Paul hosted the 2024 Jimmy & Rosalynn Carter Work Project. I was able to be a part of building 150 homes in the Heights Neighborhood of St. Paul.

During the 2024 Carter build, I thought a lot about connections and Carter. Neighbors in on the west side of Como may have noticed a lot of activity near the fairgrounds the first week of October. Before dawn and well into the evening, charter buses for the event used one of the fairgrounds parking lots as a staging area to get the over 4,000 volunteers over to the built site throughout the week. The rows of charter buses went down Snelling Avenue to shepherd folks to The Heights. Here I would see one of my Como neighbors and co-workers Shane Ellanson as we returned home from a long day on site. The volunteer t-shirts for the event also had a link to the Como neighborhood. The Branding Wearhouse, near Snelling and Como, was the source for thousands of t-shirts and other promotional items for the event.

During the build week I met up with an old friend from college who also grew up in the Como neighborhood, Steve Heinen. He is a long-time volunteer with Habitat and is retired from US Bank, a Habitat sponsor. I also ran into a Como High School graduate and friend to my kids, Richard Noren. He was working as an EMT supervisor on site. One of our former Como neighbors, Phil Henry, also works at Habitat. I like to tease him about moving out of the neighborhood. These are amazing Como Connections.

I wasn’t the only Como resident and Habitat employee that participated in this event.   Rhonda Thorson, a Project Manager at Twin Cities Habitat, was also at this 2024 event as well as the 2010 Carter Work Project, which was a scattered site “Blitz Build” in St. Paul. In 2010, according to Rhonda, “I remember the heightened security on the day President Jimmy Carter was there, but also somewhat surprised that it was still pretty relaxed. I remember there being some neighborhood opposition to our work, and affirmation from those same people as the houses got finished.”

My husband John also worked on a home during the 2010 Carter work project with his former employer. He recalls that his site needed to be shut down for one day during the week Jimmy Carter was in town. They had many security details that week and could not have all build sites open due to staffing resources.

Chris Coleman, who grew up in the Como Neighborhood, was Mayor of St. Paul during the 2010 Carter Work Project and is currently CEO and President of Twin Cities Habitat. He noted, “I was able to build on the East Side of Saint Paul with President Carter. I also recall going to Minneapolis to meet with Vice President Mondale, and former Senator Al Franken. There is a picture in my office with all of us! It’s a great memory from my mayoral days. What was also memorable was how thrilled the homeowners were!” 

The Como Neighborhood is also the location of a Habitat Home. The original home was in poor condition and was purchased by Habitat and torn down in 2008. A brand-new affordable Habitat home was constructed on the site in 2009, just down the street from Chelsea Heights Elementary School. After living in the home for 13 years, the owners sold the house back to Habitat in 2022. I was fortunate to work on the rehab of this home right in my own neighborhood, just down the street from another Twin Cities Habitat employee, Teng Lor, Warehouse Manager.  

Since the time of this home's original land purchase, our neighborhood and Twin Cities Habitat have learned a great deal about the racial covenants that we have on properties in many sections of the Como community. This particular home had a racial covenant on the land and through our buy back, rehab, and re-sale of this home, the racial covenant was discharged from this property. The discharge of this covenant reminds me that Jimmy Carter always championed racial equity and inclusion. By buying back the home, Habitat was able to maintain a unit of affordable housing in the Como neighborhood. This home has now welcomed a new family to the neighborhood. And who knows, one day the kids from that family may play with Teng’s kids.

It is amazing how many times I have seen Habitat affiliates or ReStores as I've traveled around the country. One of the ReStores we stopped at in St. Louis, MO, was just down the street from where my daughter lived. Visiting my sister in Charlotte, there is a Habitat ReStore that also served as the neighborhood coffee shop near her home. Recently, we traveled through Plains, GA, spending a wonderful morning touring the Plains High School Museum and Visitor Center: Jimmy Carter National Historical Park. It was fun to discover that Rosalynn was the valedictorian of her class! A section of the exhibit included Carter’s work with Habitat and a hammer that he used on a 1990 Carter Work Project.

I have worked with several employers over the many years I have lived in the Como neighborhood, and I had the opportunity to volunteer with those firms on Habitat builds. There were times during my career that I felt what I was doing didn’t matter. It happened that I was able to volunteer with Habitat during times when I was searching for meaning and wanting to make a difference. I was fortunate to find that mission and opportunity to use my skill set at Twin Cities Habitat.

A Como neighbor who lives just down the street from me, Jeanne Baumann, was one of the early Twin Cities Habitat employees. She shared this reflection on the Habitat.org website honoring President Carter:

“One of the greatest honors of my life was meeting Jimmy and Rosalyn at the 1993 JCWP site. With a small group of volunteers, I - as a Habitat staff member - created the Habitat 500 Bike Ride. 75 people raised $5,000 each and then rode bikes 500 miles from the Twin Cities to Winnipeg, where we donated 10% of what we raised to the JCWP. I presented that money to Jimmy on stage with Millard Fuller.” 

After listening to the stories of Jimmy Carter at the January memorial, I feel fortunate to be a small part of the connections we can make in our Como community to continue legacies, big or small, that contribute to the greater good of our society.