Rich Van Tassel, president of Royal Oaks Building Group, LLC (http://www.royaloaksbg.com), has announced that the company is building and donating a new home for a disabled veteran and his family as part of Operation: Coming Home II (www.operationcominghome.com) in its Southern Oaks community in Fuquay-Varina. The home site is being donated by neighborhood developer Gaines and Company.

Operation: Coming Home is a joint volunteer project led by the Home Builders Association of Raleigh-Wake County (HBARWC) and the Triangle Real Estate and Construction Veterans (TREACV) that builds and donates homes for disabled combat veterans.

A groundbreaking ceremony with Fuquay-Varina town council members and other local elected officials was held this morning, July 1 at 10 a.m. at the new home site in Southern Oaks located at 718 Sycamore Springs Drive . In October of 2008, Royal Oaks Building Group co-built and donated a home to veteran Joey Bozik, the project’s first recipient, a sergeant in the 16th Military Police Brigade based at Fort Bragg who was injured in 2004 when his Humvee hit a bomb south of Baghdad .



USMC Sgt. Stan Roberts and his wife, Crissy Roberts, have been selected to receive the 2010 “Hero Home” on behalf of Operation: Coming Home. A member of the 2nd AAV in Camp Lejeune , N.C. , Sgt. Roberts served three tours of duty in Iraq . During his last tour, he was injured by an improvised exploding device (IED) blast into his amphibious assault vehicle (AAV). This blast resulted in the loss of Sgt. Roberts’ right leg, injuries to his right arm and traumatic brain injury. Sgt. Roberts and his wife reside in Cary, N.C., and they plan to move in to the new home after a welcome home celebration on Nov. 4, 2010.