Local KC area news publications 3/05

ABC’s Extreme Makeover: Home Edition in Kansas City
Kevin Green Homes Chosen to Build Dream House for Local Her

(PARKVILLE, Mo.) – Early this morning, Wednesday, March 30, ABC-TV’s hit show Extreme Makeover: Home Edition surprised a family in eastern Kansas City with its trademark megaphone yell “Good Morning, Johnson Family.”

Over the next week, Kevin Green Homes of Parkville, Mo. plus a team of hundreds of area subcontractors and vendor partners will remove the furnishings, demolish the cramped three-bedroom house and build a spacious new home for Kansas City, Mo. firefighter Stephen Johnson and his five children.

“Traditionally, it takes six months to build the kind of house we’re planning but we’re up to the challenge,” says Kevin Green, president of Kevin Green Homes. “We’re going to create and outstanding new home for this deserving family and the show.”

Homes by Kevin Green Homes are some of the most desirable in the metro area.

“We knew Kevin Green’s reputation as an outstanding builder,” says Conrad Ricketts, senior producer for the show. “We are delighted he agreed to help this local hero.”

About Stephen Johnson and His Family

Stephen Johnson, 38, works three jobs to support his family; firefighter, barber and window washer. Besides raising three children of his own – Stephen, Jr., 18; Duane, 14; and G’na, 12 – he rescued two neighborhood boys – Brandon, 15; and Ryan Brownfield, 13 – from the foster care system after their adopted mother died.

One February 23, 2004, he rescued someone else. Johnson led a team of firefighters 100 feet through heavy gunfire to save MAST paramedic Mary Seymour gunned down by a deranged man who set a house on fire and lay in wait for emergency crews. Seymour survived the incident but doctors say it would have been fatal if she had arrived at the hospital two minutes later.

Johnson and the other firefighters who saved Seymour have earned the International Benjamin Franklin Fire Service Award for Valor. They will go to the White House and receive the awards from the President of he United States and the International Association of Fire Chiefs. The date for the presentation has no been scheduled.