Community Living celebrates 50 years of significant change
Posted By Sue Dickens for The Community Press
Campbellford – An anniversary celebration gala held last Friday evening marked the 50th Anniversary of Community Living Campbellford/Brighton (CLCB), an organization that has seen significant change during that time.
“The biggest change is that people (with intellectual disabilities) have left segregated settings and have been included in society,” said Nancy Brown, who has been with the organization for 25 years, the past two as executive director.
“Just look at how far we’ve come,” she added, recalling the early days when she worked with ARC (Adult Rehabilitation Centre) – a sheltered workshop – and supportive employment programs in the late 1980s as a residential care support worker.
“The local community has become so supportive and inclusive,” she said.
From the early days of the agency when Mary Cook challenged the gap in services for her daughter and others with intellectual disabilities. She responded to an newspaper advertisement by the Ontario Association for the Mentally Retarded (OAMR) that offered support to communities. As a result of Cook’s efforts, the president of the OAMR held a public meeting in the Parish Hall in Campbellford in 1960 and the response “was overwhelming” with 58 interested people attending, Brown said.
A Campbellford and district association was formed afterward and its first project culminated in the opening of Merryvale School – the first school for intellectually disabled children in Northumberland County. Eleven children, seven to 16 years of age, attended.
Six years later the association purchased the building so it could continue to provide education-based programs.
In January 1968 the Ministry of Education assumed responsibility for the school’s operation. It was then that the Campbellford and District Association began what was known as a sheltered workshop for developmentally challenged adults.
Today the association provides services and supports for approximately 100 individuals in Northumberland County.
“We have an amazing culture in this agency and a team that is passionate about their job,” Brown said.
The organization earned Counsel and Quality Leadership accreditation in 2000 and has recently become part of a provincial core competencies pilot project that is geared to ensure a consistent level of excellence.
“We are here to give (people) their own opportunities so they can shine. We try to be the connectors,” Brown said.
The agency does this by using a personal outcome measures program that establishes a priority list for the individuals it serves to help them achieve a sense of self and their world in order to fulfil their dreams.
Community Living has earned a reputation for excellence in the past decade, having won four Donner Canadian Foundation Awards for Excellence in the Delivery of Social Services, two overall and two in its category. It’s also won the Peter F. Drucker Award for Non-Profit Management for its consistent excellence and innovation in the management and delivery of services.
Looking ahead, Brown said: “One of the areas we are focusing on is families with grown children living at home and we are looking at how we can support them by considering residential options and residential and day support options for the future. All of that is very much a focus of our agency – as well as connecting and community development.
“We couldn’t do what we do without the support of the community,” Brown said. “We welcome the public’s input. It’s all about community partnership.”
Brown said CLCB is about “inspiring possibilities” and much of its success is “largely based on the number of volunteer hours” put in by family home providers.
Such as Karen McDonald who has welcomed people with intellectual disabilities into her Campbellford home for the past 14 years.
She has her own family to look after but helping others is “very heartwarming and I love to do it,” she said. “I was told one time that this is my spiritual calling.”
McDonald admits that “sometimes it is a challenge, but the good things far outweigh the bad.”
Her home is a place of safety that offers a nurturing environment.
“I am like a house parent so if the person needs counselling or guidance I am here for them,” McDonald said.”These people we have in our home are part of our family.”
“Family home is a residential model that mirrors the concept of a natural family using volunteer home providers,”CLCB executive assistant Bev Haley explained.
The nationally recognized program matches children and adults with family home providers based on interest, preference and compatibility. Many have turned into lifelong relationships.
Community Living Campbellford/Brighton offers financial reimbursement, professional support and training for all family home providers.
“There is a need for family home and respite providers in the Campbellford and Brighton communities; however, we would welcome interested people and families in Havelock, Cobourg, Trenton, Belleville and any community in between,” Haley said.
For more information visit http://communitylivingcampbellford.com/
Click on link below to listen to the commerical we have been broadcasting on 100.9 myFM Brighton radio station.
100.9 myFM Brighton Commercial
2010 marks our 50th Anniversary
a milestone achievement of providing half a century of quality support!
In 1960, our founding parent, Mary Cook, dreamed that her daughter would live in an inclusive community at a time when doctors recommended provincial institutions.
We believe, as our founder did, that people with intellectual disabilities have the right to live in and participate in their community.
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