[KHTS] – More than 120 Home Depot employees, as well as military veterans and community members, have helped Santa Clarita Valley veterans’ houses get a little closer to the home stretch.

The plan is to move veterans into the first 26 homes by March 2015, according to Donna Deutchman, CEO of Habitat for Humanity of the San Fernando and Santa Clarita valleys.

As part of that effort, the volunteers helped frame walls and worked on plumbing Sept. 9 in Saugus.

To volunteer or for more information, [click here].

“This was Home Depot’s premiere celebration of service event,” Deutchman said, “and they selected only a handful of veteran organizations around the country to show their support for those who’ve served our country, by utilizing their Team Depot program.”

The community is slated to be built next door to Bowman High School, off Centre Pointe Parkway, near Soledad Canyon Road and Ruether Avenue, in Santa Clarita.

The Habitat for Heroes project is a first-of-its-kind housing community built exclusively for veterans, with the coordination of a number of different agencies and volunteers put together by the Habitat for Humanity of the San Fernando and Santa Clarita valleys.

For the 2014 Celebration of Service, Home Depot, in partnership with hundreds of local nonprofit organizations, are transforming more than 1,000 homes for veterans across the country from 9/11 to Veterans Day.

“We are providing homes to low-income, working veterans, and they deserve only the best quality,” Deutchman said, noting there will not only be homes for the veterans, but programs to assist in financing, and partnerships with community organizations to help veterans’ transition back to civilian life.

Habitat homes are renowned for their safety and quality, she added.

CalVet and Citibank were also huge supporters, she said. The SoCal Gas Company and Union Bank also donated large amounts at a groundbreaking in November.

There’s also been a Santa Clarita Valley-based coalition of support known as the Habitat for Heroes, of which KHTS AM-1220 has been a partner, has worked to connect community services such as the nearby SCV Child and Family Center with the Habitat project.

“It was incredible to see the swell of people,” Deutchman said of the number of volunteers, including several of the veterans who were going to be living in the homes and from Team Depot. “I think when the public needs to realize when Home Depot comes out in force like that it’s not only an incredible product, but the meaning to the veterans is incredible.”

Veterans interested in the project can find information [here].

Disney and Kaboom are scheduled to help build a playground on the proposed lot Oct. 30.