Veteran’s gift to Central Oklahoma Habitat will pay for 24 houses
Central Oklahoma Habitat for Humanity’s largest single donation ever will pay for 24 new houses in the Christian charity home builder developer’ s Legacy Estates addition in northwest Oklahoma City, CEO and Chairman Ann Felton Gilliland said Thursday.
Stephen Florentz, retired U.S. Army Sgt. 1st Class, who died last year, left his estate, including his own home and $2.25 million, to Habitat. It was Central Oklahoma Habitat’s largest single gift in its 29-year history, she said.
Florentz will be honored and memorialized during a ceremony at 10 a.m. June 29 at Legacy Estates, at Council Road and Wilshire Boulevard.
Legacy Estates, which will have 146 homes when complete, also will be named for him, she said. Habitat offered naming rights as an incentive for a large donation in 2014. Legacy Estates started in 2013 but stalled in the aftermath of the May 20 tornado.
“It’s just wonderful. It’s a great blessing to our ministries to receive this contribution,” Felton Gilliland said.
She said Florentz had no close family and has yet to receive military honors. To honor him, retired U.S. Air Force Maj. Gen. Rita Aragon will talk about Florentz’s service at the ceremony.
In addition, the nonprofit Honoring America’s Warriors’ Honor Guard will render military honors and present an American flag to Stephen Florentz Trustee Michael Bourland.
The ceremony will conclude with the dedication and unveiling of a new Legacy Estates sign in Florentz’s honor.
“I was very surprised about the donation. Back in 2002, he contacted me and wanted to know about Habitat and how our program worked,” Felton Gilliland said.
She said wrote to him and sent information, and never heard back until last December, when she learned he had died and left Central Oklahoma Habitat his estate.
“I think housing was always very important to him,” she said. “He grew up in New York and always lived in an apartment growing up, so when he was able to buy a house of his own, it was really very special to him.”
Participating in the ceremony in addition to Aragon, Felton Gilliland and Honoring America’s Warriors’ Honor Guard will be Michael Bourland, trustee for Stephen Florentz Trust, and Scotty “Dee” Deatherage, executive director of Honoring America’s Warriors.