His houses rebuild lives in Guatemala

from the Star Ledger

Joe Collins celebrated with a soft drink. His 67th birthday. The construction of his 103rd house for the poorest of the poor in the Guatemalan highlands.

And the continuing re-construction of his own life.

"I don't know what led me to this," says Collins. "I guess God did. I don't know, it's just ..."

His voice trails off because this twice-divorced 6-foot-2 former Marine and saloon owner and recovering alcoholic and cancer survivor is not the sort comfortable with invoking divine intervention in his own life. Collins would think it presumptuous.

But, after a round of Christmas fundraising, Collins is headed back down to the hot rain forests of the Central American country where, he estimates, some 1.6 million Mayan indigenous people live in shacks made of cornstalks or worse.

"We've built only 103 houses in three years. We've got a long way to go."

He runs an organization called From Houses to Homes in Guatemala, an offshoot of another group he joined six years ago just as a volunteer to help build small homes for people who, he says, make a dollar or two a day working in fields.

"They have nothing," he says. "The poverty down there is not like the poverty around here."

The building of houses for poor people in Guatemala might not appear to fit into this guy's life. Before he began the work, Collins was -- as he still is -- a private detective. A specialized one. He is an adoption detective who finds children given up for adoption and parents who gave them up.

He's good at it and has become a champion of the right of adoptees to learn more about their past, testifying before the Legislature, and representing a variety of groups pressing for open adoption laws. He's lost count of the number of adoptions he's investigated, but it's in the thousands.

"It's how I pay the bills," says Collins. "I can do that kind of work anywhere I can bring a laptop."

His interest in Guatemala began when he visited his son Darron there in 1999. Darron Collins, Joe's only child, was doing anthropological research for a Ph.D. from Tulane.

"Just a visit. He was down there for two years, and I wanted to see him."

What he saw appalled him. People sleeping in the streets. Or in shacks with no water. When he returned to the states, to his apartment in Morristown, the town where he grew up, the images wouldn't let go.

"Then one night I was just sitting in front of the computer and typed 'volunteering in Guatemala.'" He found an organization that built houses there and joined it, spending parts of three summers helping to build houses. When the group shifted its emphasis to Africa, Collins figured he could continue.

At $1,500 a house, he built 24 in 2005 and another 24 in 2006 and, now, this year, 55. He raises money, recruits volunteers, even opened an office in Antigua. His construction of 12-by-19-foot concrete and stucco houses -- along with his donation of school and health care fees to the poor -- attracted the attention of the nation's first lady, Wendy Widmann de Berger, a social reformer who visited Collins' operation.

He returns home to tend to his adoption work and raise money -- speaking at churches and other places, urging people to do the math. A few bucks from everybody here wouldn't be missed but could provide a house to everyone who needs a roof.

Collins is not a political guy -- and he's proud of the four years he spent as a Marine -- but he'll mention in passing that we probably owe something to the people in Guatemala, a country where the CIA engineered a coup that led to decades of civil strife.

"Why shouldn't we be helping these people? They are Americans, after all. Central Americans."

After his stint in the Marines, he opened a bar in Morristown with his brother. He says the business was successful but turned him into a drunk and that ruined his marriage. He's been sober since 1988. He still looks big and strong, although in the last year he's suffered a heart attack and just got through colon cancer.

"I'm doing all right," Collins says.

While home, he's writing out nearly a thousand Christmas cards, all with a pitch for money for his organization. Then he'll go back to Guatemala Dec. 30. New Year's Eve doesn't hold much of an attraction for him up here any more.

"I'm usually asleep by 10 p.m."

Bob Braun's columns appear Monday and Thursday. He may be reached at rbraun@starledger.com or (973) 392-4281. For more information about Collins' organization, click on www.fromhousestohomes.org.