Now *this* is supporting the troops. A heartwarming story of volunteerism.

Community on a mission to help wounded Iraq vet
Dozens volunteer in Wharton to finish building by Thanksgiving

BY LAURA BRUNO
DAILY RECORD
Sunday, August 19, 2007

WHARTON

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Eresman is known as the taskmaster on the site. The Rockaway Township contractor is determined to see wounded Iraq war veteran Army Spc. Jim Benoit and his wife, Pamela, in their home for Thanksgiving. With an all-volunteer crew working primarily on Saturdays to build the two-story, 2,400-square-foot Colonial-style house, Eresman said there is no time to lose.

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Dozens of volunteers, skilled and unskilled, have dedicated hundreds of hours and poured sweat on 90 degree-plus days working the past two and half months to turn a hole in the ground on Eileen Court into a framed building with a completed roof.

Borough police, council members, teachers and residents had gotten the site ready months earlier, spreading crushed stone and pouring concrete to install the foundation. Since then, reinforcements from across Morris County and the state have joined the effort.

Many have never even met the Benoits, who spent May through July at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C., as Jim Benoit underwent his 80th surgery to repair injuries he suffered in Iraq. Benoit was left permanently disabled when an insurgent's homemade bomb detonated under his armored Humvee on a Baghdad road in September 2005.

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Febbi, 59, of Oceanside, Ca., is a former Butler resident who was visiting his daughter and newborn granddaughter in June, when he learned of the Benoit project. He hasn't left since. Febbi, who visits the site every day, often arriving before 7 a.m., kick-started the construction by organizing the volunteers and overseeing donations of supplies.

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