June 25th, 2009 
joel UPDATE (from a press release): On June 25, “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition” travels to Erie, Pa., to meet the indomitable Clara Ward, who has cast the adversity of her health and surroundings aside to run a nonprofit youth development and family center from her home. Team leader Ty Pennington, his designers and hundreds of volunteers will rebuild Clara’s home in seven days, enabling her to continue her big-hearted work in support of the neighborhood’s underprivileged children.” The design team for this episode of “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition” will feature team leader Ty Pennington and designers Paul DiMeo, Paige Hemmis and Grammy-Award-winning, R&B recording artist, Mary J. Blige.
The location address is: The Ward Family, 650 East 21st Street and will be opened to the public starting on Saturday Sunday. Warning: the streets are closed around the construction site and traffic is snarling in the area.
Helpful Links:
Sometime Thursday morning, Ty Pennington will grab the noticeably low-tech bullhorn to rouse an Erie family and tell them that their lives would be changed forever. The deserving family will be sent on a amazing vacation while Ty and his crew build the family a new home in seven days.
Here are the latest details:
- The family will be revealed to the public about noon Thursday, and interviews with the family will appear on the Thursday evening news. Sometime after 4 PM the family will embark on their vacation
- Friday will be a construction setup day
- Saturday demo occurs
- Sunday the house framing and construction begins
- All slots for volunteers are long taken, however Grace Church in McKean is looking for help for the accompanying neighborhood side projects that will be happening. Some $20,000 in cash will be needed and you can donate by clicking here
- Donations for the build, as well as for the Maleno Family-to-Family fund are also needed
You can follow the project’s progress at www.malenoextremehome.com. We will update you later Thursday on this post as the family’s name is released.
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I was very disappointed with WJET’s coverage of what could have been a coup for them. All they did was really pimp their coverage for later in the day. I realize that they were under strict guidelines from the network on what they could and could not do before the big announcement, but surely someone could have had file footage of the show fed to them. At the very least a background piece on the Makeover series with nat full of up of Ty…”Move that Bus!!!”
Chris Serinelli did a fine job at 11PM despite having his “Live” shot blown in the tag leaving him to stand there after his package like a deer in the headlights (an all-to-common look among Erie reporter these days)
I wish someone would get creative again with Erie TV news. Just once I wish a station would live up to all the hype and deliver a solid half hour of news and information…just once.
For my viewing buck, Stu Nash and the gang on the Millcreek channel put out more compelling stuff than the local pros!