Funded in part by the Tennessee Department of Transportation, the Delta HRA Transportation program serves the counties of Tipton, Lauderdale, Fayette and Rural Shelby County.  Wesley Fowler directs the program.  In addition to providing medical trips, Delta HRA also transports passengers for employment, to the grocery store, etc.  According to Delta Executive Director Adrienne McGarity, r egardless of your age, income, or special need, Delta HRA can accommodate and is happy to serve you!

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It could qualify as a "tiny house": four rooms, plus an attic and crawl space, equipped with sinks, a gas range, washer and dryer, water heater and a flat-screen television.   But Jason Estes hopes the building will have a big effect on Knoxville's affordable housing market.

"The Knoxville-Knox County Community Action Committee Training House, built in a garage bay on the lower level of Knoxville CAC's L.T. Ross Building on Western Avenue, is designed to instruct contractors and others in  weatherization  techniques, which can dramatically lower utility bills," said Jason, Director for Housing Rehabilitation and Construction Services at the Knoxville-Knox County CAC.

Jason had seen similar training houses in Virginia and Atlanta, but there wasn't one in the Tennessee Valley. So he contacted Tennessee Valley Authority, which agreed to foot the bill of constructing the model home, about $116,000.

 

Now the house, completed at the end of September, can be used to train the state's auditors, local crews who do weatherization through CAC's program, and even students with  SEEED , Socially Equal Energy Efficient Development, a Knoxville nonprofit that trains at-risk youth. "It's been used every week so far," Jason said.

"Anyone can come here and do training." 

The house was built with a different type of siding on each wall, which can be removed to show people how to install insulation. It includes different types of gutters, soffits and vents. The crawl space has half of the ground cover it should; half of that is installed correctly.   "We try to show people different types of materials you'd run into in these neighborhoods," Jason said.

Inside, doors swing open to give a view behind the drywall. One wall is clear, so framing and wiring behind it is fully visible. There's a gas connection with a stove hooked up, and a working electric meter and fusebox.  Opening and closing the garage doors to the bay can simulate weather conditions outside the house; infrared cameras can help those training find hidden flaws. Seventeen dampers can open and close to change conditions inside the house.

And it's not useful for weather alone - last month, the house was used to train contractors in the safe removal of the lead-based paint found in many older houses.  "We can turn the furnace on; we can turn the water heater on," Jason said. "We can change pressures in the house. We can create flame rollout. ... Basically, it's a test house. You can come out here and learn how to do an energy audit."

With money from KUB's (Knoxville Utilities Board) Round It Up donation program, Knoxville CAC uses local contractors to make about 150 homes a year, whose owners meet  certain eligibility requirements , energy efficient. Knoxville CAC also oversaw the weatherization of 1,300 houses over two years through the TVA-funded  Knoxville Extreme Energy Makeover , though that program has ended.