New Hanover supported housing welcomes first residents
Published: 08-30-2024 6:33 PM
Modified: 08-31-2024 7:34 PM |
HANOVER — Sarah Peters helped her three sisters move to college and, afterward, saw them settled in homes of their own.
She wanted to do the same one day, to have her own apartment that she could decorate however she wanted. She wanted to be able to spend more time with her friends.
“Excited,” was the word that came to mind when Peters, 36, thought about moving out of the apartment she shared with her mother in Claremont.
Until this month, Peters would board a bus in the early morning hours from a stop near the apartment to get to her job at Dartmouth Dining in Hanover. The trip would take around an hour each way and while Peters didn’t necessarily mind the journey, she looked forward to the day when she no longer had to make it.
Peters is somewhat independent — she makes her own food, does her own laundry and can navigate public transportation. However, her intellectual disability and mild form of cerebral palsy mean that in order to live on her own, apart from her mother, she needs assistance establishing routines, and then keeping to them once they’re in place.
She and her new housemates have found the support they need at Spruce House on South Park Street in downtown Hanover, the Enfield-based nonprofit Visions for Creative Housing Solution’s newest home for people with developmental disabilities.
For Peters, the move to Hanover means she gets to sleep in before work and can walk to her morning shift in less than 10 minutes.
For Peters’ mother, Patricia, the move has meant entrusting Visions with the care and support she has provided to her daughter for nearly four decades.
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There’s a widely accepted rhythm when it comes to parenting: You raise your children and then launch them into the world to carve out a space for themselves. For parents of children with special needs, however, it is seldom that straightforward.
Sure, there are support systems in schools and community agencies; mentors and health aides, help from family members and friends. But there’s always that nagging thought and worry: What will happen to my children when I’m no longer able to care for them myself?
“I know Sarah will never be just left,” Patricia Peters, 65, said in an interview with her daughter earlier this summer.
“She’s very independent. However, you can’t help but naturally put supports in place just because we’ve been a team forever, right? And a great team,” Patricia Peters said while looking at her daughter at the apartment they shared in Claremont. “But I think it’ll be great, and it makes me feel good as a mom, for her … to start learning how to operate on her own in the world, right?”
Like Peters, Olivia Guziewicz, 26, who lived with her mother, Elizabeth Calder, before moving to Spruce House, is largely independent.
Guziewicz has a rare genetic disorder called GLUT1 Deficiency Syndrome, which can cause seizures and limit her mobility. Guziewicz keeps to a strict Ketogenic diet to manage her symptoms and handles all her prescriptions. She regularly goes horseback riding, volunteers at the Sullivan County Humane Society, and works out at the gym, but she often had to rely on Calder to get her places and wanted more independence.
She had been on the Visions waiting list when Calder got a call this spring that they had a spot at Spruce House for Guziewicz. Calder and Guziewicz took some time to think about it.
“At first I didn’t want anything to do with Visions,” Guziewicz said.
As the days went on, she talked it over with other family members who told her: ” ‘It’s exciting. You get to build your own life and get a job and do things that you never did before’,” she recalled. “And then immediately after that, I was like, ‘OK Mom, I want to do this.’ ”
Calder, 54, initially “thought, ‘Well, this is soon, emotionally,’ ” she said in an interview at her Claremont home with Guziewicz.
“But then I thought about the big picture: OK, so what’s the quality of her life now with regard to her just advancing with a job, with friendships, with things like that? Because I can only provide so much, right?”
In Claremont, Guziewicz spent a lot of her days alone. She was looking forward to getting a job and the companionship of her other housemates. Her mother was looking forward to that too.
“I don’t have really any apprehension about her going there,” Calder said. “Basically, it’s a continuation of all the things I’ve done for her the past 26 and a half years. They’re now going to continue that.”
Sylvia Dow and her husband, David, laid the groundwork for the Visions, an Enfield-based nonprofit organization, about two decades ago. The couple have two daughters with developmental disabilities and wanted to create a place where they could live independently with others.
“I wanted to make sure that my children had a place to live with friends, with support, with care and kindness, so I know that if David and I were no longer able to take care of them, they would just still thrive,” Dow said during an interview at Spruce House in June when it was still under construction.
“We fought for inclusion in schools. We fought for being in the community, getting jobs,” Dow said. Creating a place for their children to live was an extension of that. “We understand like no one else does what our children need.”
Visions got its official start in 2014 when Sunrise Farm — which was previously run by Dow’s family as an inn — opened in Enfield. Green Street Commons in Lebanon followed in 2021. Sunrise and Green Street are each home to 10 residents.
Then, an opportunity to open a third location presented itself. Spruce House was formerly the site of Outreach House, a nonprofit assisted living facility, in Hanover. When Outreach House closed in 2019, it donated its building to Visions.
Initially, Visions hoped to renovate the space but the organization determined it was too difficult to convert it to meet residents’ needs. Instead, Outreach House was demolished and Spruce House rose up in its place.
Spruce House is three stories tall. Visions will employ around two dozen staff members to support the 12 residents who are all expected to move in by the end of September.
Social Security money can be used for room and board, while Medicaid pays for the cost of support services that Visions staff provide. Those two funding sources do not cover all of the nonprofit’s costs so staff continue to raise money by applying for grants and asking for private donations.
To fund Spruce House’s construction, Visions launched a capital campaign to raise $4.2 million, including grants, private donations and funds through the Affordable Housing Competitive Funding Program and New Hampshire’s Community Development Finance Authority’s business tax credit program.
Visions’ waiting list currently stands at 35 people. Dow has been advising other groups throughout the country so that they can create similar supported housing.
“It is on the backs of parents because we can’t just wait for an agency … to magically say ‘Oh we’re going to build you a forever home for your children,’ (and) that they’ll get love and support and get to live with their friends and have independence,” Dow said. “It just doesn’t happen. So it really is up to families to make it happen.”
In the months leading up to move-in day, Spruce House’s residents and their families got to know each other. They spent hours talking to staff: There was paperwork to fill out and questions to answer about daily routines. They volunteered in Hanover and atte nded open houses to get to know their new neighbors.
In late July, residents from all three Visions locations gathered to celebra te the organization’s 10th anniversary with a party at Colburn Park in downtown Lebanon. FLAME the band, which features musicians with developmental disabilities, performed. Sarah Peters danced along, holding a sign she made featuring a quote by Martin Luther King Jr. that read: “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.”
Peters and Guziewicz put together packing lists. One of Peters’ sisters sent over a list of suggestions. Guziewicz and Calder added items to an Amazon wishlist.
Peters and Guziewicz made plans for how they would decorate their separate apartments: Peters, with furniture her late father made and Guziewicz with items inspired by the American Southwest, like one of her tattoos. Both were excited they’d be able to bring their cats with them.
They also gave input into how they wanted Spruce House to be put together.
“This is their home,” Dow said. “They get to decide what it’s going to look like.”
One of the contractors asked residents what they’d like to see on Spruce House’s deck.
“I said a hammock and a margarita bar,” Guziewicz recalled with a laugh.
Staff also made sure every detail was taken care of, including ones that might not be as obvious such as a toilet paper holder that a roll could easily slip on and off from. Each apartment and the building as a whole meets requirements set forth by the Americans with Disabilities Act. An elevator connects all three floors and the basement. Peters in particular was excited about that because the apartment she shared with her mother could only be accessed by stairs.
“My friends can come,” to visit, she said. There was already talk of the sleepovers they’d be able to have.
Residents began moving in in July, with help from friends, family and Visions staff. The arrivals have been staggered so that Visions could continue to hire staff to support residents, Dow said. The goal is for all of Spruce House’s 12 residents to move in by the end of September.
Peters, who moved in on Aug. 15, opened the curtains in her new apartment on an afternoon shortly after her arrival. Across the street, people played on Dartmouth’s tennis courts. Peters’ cat, Darla, meowed for attention.
“It’s very good,” Peters said about living at Visions. She pointed out the table and dresser her father made and the colorful rug she picked out with her mother. An avid runner, Peters had already discovered routes around her new neighborhood.
A few days later, she sat down to play a game of Uno with her housemates as Dow and a resident finished preparing a salad for dinner.
“Uh oh,” Peters said as the color of the cards switched to turquoise.
“It doesn’t help me either,” replied Guziewicz, who moved in on Aug. 5.
A few turns later, Peters declared “Uno” and won, just as dinner was ready. Conversation flowed, from if the rain would hold off that evening to making plans for a Labor Day gathering at Spruce House for all Visions residents.
“Have we done positives yet?” Sylvia Dow asked.
Guziewicz, who was finishing up a meal of fish she prepared herself, spoke first.
“I’m positive to have this wonderful dinner with my friends,” Guziewicz said. She added she was looking forward to taking a walk after dinner with everyone around the table.
“My positive is that there’s always people around,” added Peters, who was seated next to Guziewicz. Peters was eating a pasta and chicken casserole prepared by another resident.
When asked what her “positive” was, Dow said, “I have so many today.” There was the dinner; there was seeing everyone together. “I love that you all are getting to know each other.”
After dinner, Peters and Guziewicz took the elevator to retrieve Guziewicz’ wheelchair, which she likes to use on walks, from a storage room.
They joined the others outside, passing a sign on a bulletin board that read: “All are welcome in this house. We live, love, laugh and care for each other.”
Liz Sauchelli can be reached at esauchelli@vnews.com or 603-727-3221. Alex Driehaus can be reached at adriehaus@vnews.com.
CORRECTION: Spruce House, Visions for Creative Housing Solution’s new home for people with developmental disabilities, is on South Park Street in Hanover. A previous version of this story included an incorrect location.