Rebuilding Houses, Lives and Neighborhoods in Greater Kansas City

Christmas In October was started in 1984 by Dick Miller and John McMeel, the founders, along with about 100 volunteers, including friends, family and students from Rockhurst High School. They worked on 20 houses their first year. Since then, the program has grown to include thousands of volunteers from hundreds of different organizations from throughout the metropolitan area working on over 400 houses each year. It is one of the largest volunteer programs of its kind in the United States.

The homeowners we seek to help are primarily the elderly and disabled, but also includes other homeowners with young children, who lack the financial resources and skills to make necessary repairs to their homes.
This program is about more than the homeowners we help though. It also brings together people from the whole social-economic spectrum. It provides an opportunity for people to become more intimately familiar and connected with neighborhoods they might not otherwise have reason to visit but hear about on the news; and it provides an opportunity for people to build better relationships with other volunteers and the residents of those neighborhoods. It also provides a great opportunity for people and businesses to contribute to the community in a very direct and positive way. We estimate that we currently have an impact of over $2 million on the community each year.