Seasonal Workers Hit The Hay

Recognizing the housing needs of the state's thousands of seasonal farmworkers, advocacy group Telamon Corporation has partnered with some Virginia farmers to build affordable and energy-efficient homes using bales of hay. Federal grants are being used to fund nearly two-thirds of the project, which will provide housing for seasonal farmworkers for up to 20 years

"Workers began building the foundations of the four houses about three weeks ago on the edge of a field where the nursery is growing shrubbery and trees. Lumber framing and the roofs will go up next. Then, Telamon volunteers will stack the straw bales to form the walls of each house and coat them with a weather-resistant plaster of sand and clay."

"Telamon architect Greg Miller said straw-bale construction for the nursery's houses will run about $85 a square foot, or about $10 less than the national average for conventional homes. Construction would have been even cheaper, he said, had the buildings not been custom-designed to include passive solar heating and cooling features."