hello at a young age I was given a lot
of responsibility in my life I was my
mother’s right hand
my father’s next in kin and to my
brother with autism his entire world
when I was growing up I wanted to be a
doctor you know to cure autism but that
obviously wasn’t my path because I was
the only female and my heavy equipment
program at Momoko BOCES and I was one of
the only women in the construction
management engineering program at Alfred
State College at Alfred they prepare you
to hit the ground running and that
statement couldn’t be more true to this
day because when my father unexpectedly
died at the age of 52 exactly two months
after I walked that stage at my college
graduation I had to take over the family
construction business that just so
happened to be a giant sandbox in my
back yard that’s called a gravel pit and
it’s not what I had planned for my life
but I wouldn’t change it for anything in
the world because it’s made me who I am
today
my father’s bulldozer taught me how to
climb mountains obstacles and challenges
and it taught me about real life that a
textbook never could my daily motivation
has growing up with autism
my brother has a type of autism that no
one talks about he’s not your average
Rain Man he’s not a lead character and
ABC’s new hit TV show and he’s not gonna
be running the gravel pit anytime soon
he’s nonverbal he can’t handle change
he has extreme OCD and he suffers from
something called self-injurious
behaviors which is something he only
developed during puberty but he’s also a
child stuck in a man’s body he loves to
be tickled he loves watching Disney
this is my brother with autism and this
is reality in a photograph so we asked
the question what happens when autism
grows up what happens when autism grows
up is the biggest thing that our
disability community wants everyone to
know in the disability community when
your child transitions out of the school
system and enters into the real world
you’re losing that support system and
so you look for a day program you look
for a work program you look for a group
home and sometimes those options are few
and they’re rare and they’re very
selective so people like my brother who
have high behaviors and many needs they
go on a waiting list and that as a
parent and caregivers worst nightmare
I’m here to tell the story that my
brother fell off that cliff
before the program was available to help
support him we waited almost 10 years
with no help and sip in side of our home
no day program to look forward to and
there was no group home here locally
regionally or across the state
my brother’s fate came down to the
paperwork in his file it came down to
his diagnosis while that happened while
we were waiting my father had died and
it’s something my mother and I had to
take on all by ourselves the dream that
my father and I shared was to use my
education to take the construction
business and to develop group homes for
people with special needs and now I have
to do that all by myself
because this is the reality that we
can’t wait any longer someone’s got to
do something someone’s got to do
something about this so I decided to do
something different for once in my life
because the last thing I wanted to do
and ever again was to get out of work a
12-hour day on the bulldozer in the
ground
and come home and be sad and depressed
and watching the same exact Disney movie
we watched all week so I decided to take
him to a farm for the very first time it
just so happened to be down the street
and it was owned by my uncle and we’re
definitely out of our comfort zone I
remember that day like it was yesterday
I took my brother on this beautiful walk
along the wide waters of the Erie Canal
and remember he was fascinated because
as the Ducks were flying in and they’re
all splattering and all their beautiful
patterns he was just so mesmerised now
I’m walking a little farther ahead of
him at this point and I just wanted to
look behind and what I saw was the most
beautiful smile a smile on him because
he was so mesmerized about how those
sunflowers were so tall and bigger than
him in his head he’s seeing the rays of
sunshine coming through the field and
he’s seeing the wave and the wind
blowing these sunflowers around and at
that very moment I thought we’re in
nature’s classroom
we’re in nature’s classroom and I
thought this has been the best
experience ever he’s having no behaviors
he does not have OCD he’s so calm he’s
at peace and so am i and I thought I can
get used to this so we continued our
walk our talk about the birds and the
bees literally and we went and sat down
by the Erie Canal and it was a beautiful
sunset in the background and my brother
is still content at that time at that
time so I had to take my phone out and I
had to Google farms for autism because I
can’t be the only one that’s ever come
up with this right right what I found
was a wave of intentional agricultural
style communities across our country
that offer a special place for people
with disabilities and as you can see
there is nothing like it in our region
from Albany to Buffalo this concept has
never come here yet this far so that
next day our lives changed forever we
had hope for the first time in a very
long time and my mother started taking
my brother to the farm to go to work he
would do chores in the greenhouse
he would be out harvesting vegetables
and we even played a game with him with
bell peppers so that he could toss them
and have engagement while he was picking
so he would continue his work he would
Cheers has bottled water with the other
farmers so during work time and break
time and they couldn’t speak English so
it worked out great because he can’t
talk either had to mention that and he
had true inclusion so they would thank
him with having some vegetables that he
could sell at the farm the farm stand
and he was part of the whole experience
he was greeting the customers he was
working the money dealing with the
change packaging the produce and even
bringing it to people’s cars and at that
very moment we knew that something was
so great there and one day he made
almost 200 dollars that’s a lot of
Disney movies so what happened next was
my brother was our pilot for our farm my
mother was my partner and I started
developing a business plan for our
future essentially in total I visited 15
community farms across our country from
California and back and each of them
have their own culture and concept and
some of my favorites include bittersweet
farms in Ohio which is a beautiful
original farmstead that serves people
with disabilities and they have a proven
therapeutic model that serves people
with disabilities through gardening and
farming then we have Benjamin’s Hope
which is located in Michigan and what
they offer is a beautiful housing
community and when I stayed there that
evening my favorite part was watching
these kids on their bikes their trikes
their scooters or two-seaters just doing
laps in the cul de sac at dusk I’ve been
to down-home ranch which is in rural
Texas and when I say that these
individuals a Down Syndrome earn their
keep on a rural ranch they do and then
we have the Brookwood community which is
the most beautiful and exciting
community because they’ve got it right
they’ve been around for almost 60 years
and they have created sustainable
business models
that provide actual wages for people
with disabilities here’s Chucky being
our pilot so happy on this farm that I
knew I had to do something so in my
travels I ended up at a conference in
Chicago at miser cordilla which is a
30-acre housing community in downtown
Chicago and it was most amazing
experience I had to have been the
luckiest girl in the world at that very
moment because I was a very good student
and I’m sitting very close in the front
and sitting next to the only
disability-specific funder in the room
that everyone want to talk to and he was
like right there right there right in
the front row so my good deed definitely
has paid off
so we started talking and I he says how
can I help you I need to buy a farm I
need to buy a farm to create an
intentional community to serve people in
my hometown of Rochester New York I want
to include people of all abilities to
provide them a place to be inclusive and
sustainable to truly allow them to learn
work live and grow for people of all
abilities it’s not about the tomato sir
it’s about growing people I would like
to grow people’s unique abilities in
nature’s classroom in the September of
2016 with the support of the man that I
was sitting next to that I barely knew
who believed in me more than I think I
ever believed in myself
he gave him an opportunity so that I
could collect parent professionals
like-minded community members so that we
could plant roots on this beautiful 55
acre farm where it all had happened that
one day with my brother in a sunflower
field Rochester is now home to the first
intentional community that serves people
as you can see it is the land of
opportunity it is less than 20 minutes
from where we are standing right now
it’s an excellent proximity to
transportation our education and our
business partners and it has everything
we need to create our full vision for
the future so what happened next we hit
the ground running because that’s what
I’ve been taught to do in the spring of
2017 and continuing here in 2017 we
serve young adults with and without
disabilities and provide them a place to
truly learn work live and grow and
that’s through our program called a
community farm experience where we offer
educational classes vocational training
and social and recreational
opportunities in partnership with
parents as partners our volunteers and
many business owners we create
individualize approach to each person’s
learning a growing plan to allow us to
analyze their unique goals and abilities
so that we can grow them into the
greater community what we are is a
community organization we are not to be
confused with an agency and currently as
a grassroots initiative we depend on
donations grants agritourism on the farm
self-directed programs we run and
affordable memberships what we’re
creating every single day to meet the
need because it’s thousands of people is
an opportunity and phase one to learn
which is creating more spaces in our
classrooms a green house classroom a
market classroom an estate home with a
teaching kitchen and a large barn for an
enterprise center as well as expanding
our gardens and out into the greater
property of 55 acres in Phase two we’re
really trying to create more spaces to
actually work and that includes real
models for employment
that will sustain our organizational
mission that can include the farm market
the general store the floral shop the
farm-to-table cafe and as you can see
that picture in the bottom we were told
that it would be a great place for a
marina and a vineyard phase 3 is a place
to live
now our community already offers the
opportunity to provide great
relationships and real friends but what
we’re trying to create as a give people
a place to call home so that includes a
30 acre housing community that’s going
to serve people inclusively of all
different abilities and it’s something
that our community needs right now and
finally a place to grow what we ought to
offer is not just a horizontal learning
curve we want people to go out and have
everything that they need to be out and
be successful in the greater community
but that also includes a door that’s
always open to come back I don’t know
where I would be without autism it’s
like someone gave me a mission in life
to be the voice for those that didn’t
have one and my brother Chuckie
he’s a non verbal hero his story is
paving the way for a smoother transition
for adults in the future
my mother is currently creating her
legacy so that no family ever has to
walk alone through our struggles through
our struggles we found hope in the
absolute darkest hour but now we’re
holding a torch so that we can empower
others and share these dreams for the
people in this room I want you to know
that you’re not alone that hope is here
and then it’s happening and for my new
friends that I get to meet I want every
one of you to think about changing the
world and we might not be able to change
it at large but we can change it right
here and now and I want you to get on
your bulldozer I want you to find your
own path I want you to knock down any
fear and self-doubt and I want you to be
able to create your own
because you never know where you’re
gonna end up this is my life worth living thank you
of responsibility in my life I was my
mother’s right hand
my father’s next in kin and to my
brother with autism his entire world
when I was growing up I wanted to be a
doctor you know to cure autism but that
obviously wasn’t my path because I was
the only female and my heavy equipment
program at Momoko BOCES and I was one of
the only women in the construction
management engineering program at Alfred
State College at Alfred they prepare you
to hit the ground running and that
statement couldn’t be more true to this
day because when my father unexpectedly
died at the age of 52 exactly two months
after I walked that stage at my college
graduation I had to take over the family
construction business that just so
happened to be a giant sandbox in my
back yard that’s called a gravel pit and
it’s not what I had planned for my life
but I wouldn’t change it for anything in
the world because it’s made me who I am
today
my father’s bulldozer taught me how to
climb mountains obstacles and challenges
and it taught me about real life that a
textbook never could my daily motivation
has growing up with autism
my brother has a type of autism that no
one talks about he’s not your average
Rain Man he’s not a lead character and
ABC’s new hit TV show and he’s not gonna
be running the gravel pit anytime soon
he’s nonverbal he can’t handle change
he has extreme OCD and he suffers from
something called self-injurious
behaviors which is something he only
developed during puberty but he’s also a
child stuck in a man’s body he loves to
be tickled he loves watching Disney
this is my brother with autism and this
is reality in a photograph so we asked
the question what happens when autism
grows up what happens when autism grows
up is the biggest thing that our
disability community wants everyone to
know in the disability community when
your child transitions out of the school
system and enters into the real world
you’re losing that support system and
so you look for a day program you look
for a work program you look for a group
home and sometimes those options are few
and they’re rare and they’re very
selective so people like my brother who
have high behaviors and many needs they
go on a waiting list and that as a
parent and caregivers worst nightmare
I’m here to tell the story that my
brother fell off that cliff
before the program was available to help
support him we waited almost 10 years
with no help and sip in side of our home
no day program to look forward to and
there was no group home here locally
regionally or across the state
my brother’s fate came down to the
paperwork in his file it came down to
his diagnosis while that happened while
we were waiting my father had died and
it’s something my mother and I had to
take on all by ourselves the dream that
my father and I shared was to use my
education to take the construction
business and to develop group homes for
people with special needs and now I have
to do that all by myself
because this is the reality that we
can’t wait any longer someone’s got to
do something someone’s got to do
something about this so I decided to do
something different for once in my life
because the last thing I wanted to do
and ever again was to get out of work a
12-hour day on the bulldozer in the
ground
and come home and be sad and depressed
and watching the same exact Disney movie
we watched all week so I decided to take
him to a farm for the very first time it
just so happened to be down the street
and it was owned by my uncle and we’re
definitely out of our comfort zone I
remember that day like it was yesterday
I took my brother on this beautiful walk
along the wide waters of the Erie Canal
and remember he was fascinated because
as the Ducks were flying in and they’re
all splattering and all their beautiful
patterns he was just so mesmerised now
I’m walking a little farther ahead of
him at this point and I just wanted to
look behind and what I saw was the most
beautiful smile a smile on him because
he was so mesmerized about how those
sunflowers were so tall and bigger than
him in his head he’s seeing the rays of
sunshine coming through the field and
he’s seeing the wave and the wind
blowing these sunflowers around and at
that very moment I thought we’re in
nature’s classroom
we’re in nature’s classroom and I
thought this has been the best
experience ever he’s having no behaviors
he does not have OCD he’s so calm he’s
at peace and so am i and I thought I can
get used to this so we continued our
walk our talk about the birds and the
bees literally and we went and sat down
by the Erie Canal and it was a beautiful
sunset in the background and my brother
is still content at that time at that
time so I had to take my phone out and I
had to Google farms for autism because I
can’t be the only one that’s ever come
up with this right right what I found
was a wave of intentional agricultural
style communities across our country
that offer a special place for people
with disabilities and as you can see
there is nothing like it in our region
from Albany to Buffalo this concept has
never come here yet this far so that
next day our lives changed forever we
had hope for the first time in a very
long time and my mother started taking
my brother to the farm to go to work he
would do chores in the greenhouse
he would be out harvesting vegetables
and we even played a game with him with
bell peppers so that he could toss them
and have engagement while he was picking
so he would continue his work he would
Cheers has bottled water with the other
farmers so during work time and break
time and they couldn’t speak English so
it worked out great because he can’t
talk either had to mention that and he
had true inclusion so they would thank
him with having some vegetables that he
could sell at the farm the farm stand
and he was part of the whole experience
he was greeting the customers he was
working the money dealing with the
change packaging the produce and even
bringing it to people’s cars and at that
very moment we knew that something was
so great there and one day he made
almost 200 dollars that’s a lot of
Disney movies so what happened next was
my brother was our pilot for our farm my
mother was my partner and I started
developing a business plan for our
future essentially in total I visited 15
community farms across our country from
California and back and each of them
have their own culture and concept and
some of my favorites include bittersweet
farms in Ohio which is a beautiful
original farmstead that serves people
with disabilities and they have a proven
therapeutic model that serves people
with disabilities through gardening and
farming then we have Benjamin’s Hope
which is located in Michigan and what
they offer is a beautiful housing
community and when I stayed there that
evening my favorite part was watching
these kids on their bikes their trikes
their scooters or two-seaters just doing
laps in the cul de sac at dusk I’ve been
to down-home ranch which is in rural
Texas and when I say that these
individuals a Down Syndrome earn their
keep on a rural ranch they do and then
we have the Brookwood community which is
the most beautiful and exciting
community because they’ve got it right
they’ve been around for almost 60 years
and they have created sustainable
business models
that provide actual wages for people
with disabilities here’s Chucky being
our pilot so happy on this farm that I
knew I had to do something so in my
travels I ended up at a conference in
Chicago at miser cordilla which is a
30-acre housing community in downtown
Chicago and it was most amazing
experience I had to have been the
luckiest girl in the world at that very
moment because I was a very good student
and I’m sitting very close in the front
and sitting next to the only
disability-specific funder in the room
that everyone want to talk to and he was
like right there right there right in
the front row so my good deed definitely
has paid off
so we started talking and I he says how
can I help you I need to buy a farm I
need to buy a farm to create an
intentional community to serve people in
my hometown of Rochester New York I want
to include people of all abilities to
provide them a place to be inclusive and
sustainable to truly allow them to learn
work live and grow for people of all
abilities it’s not about the tomato sir
it’s about growing people I would like
to grow people’s unique abilities in
nature’s classroom in the September of
2016 with the support of the man that I
was sitting next to that I barely knew
who believed in me more than I think I
ever believed in myself
he gave him an opportunity so that I
could collect parent professionals
like-minded community members so that we
could plant roots on this beautiful 55
acre farm where it all had happened that
one day with my brother in a sunflower
field Rochester is now home to the first
intentional community that serves people
as you can see it is the land of
opportunity it is less than 20 minutes
from where we are standing right now
it’s an excellent proximity to
transportation our education and our
business partners and it has everything
we need to create our full vision for
the future so what happened next we hit
the ground running because that’s what
I’ve been taught to do in the spring of
2017 and continuing here in 2017 we
serve young adults with and without
disabilities and provide them a place to
truly learn work live and grow and
that’s through our program called a
community farm experience where we offer
educational classes vocational training
and social and recreational
opportunities in partnership with
parents as partners our volunteers and
many business owners we create
individualize approach to each person’s
learning a growing plan to allow us to
analyze their unique goals and abilities
so that we can grow them into the
greater community what we are is a
community organization we are not to be
confused with an agency and currently as
a grassroots initiative we depend on
donations grants agritourism on the farm
self-directed programs we run and
affordable memberships what we’re
creating every single day to meet the
need because it’s thousands of people is
an opportunity and phase one to learn
which is creating more spaces in our
classrooms a green house classroom a
market classroom an estate home with a
teaching kitchen and a large barn for an
enterprise center as well as expanding
our gardens and out into the greater
property of 55 acres in Phase two we’re
really trying to create more spaces to
actually work and that includes real
models for employment
that will sustain our organizational
mission that can include the farm market
the general store the floral shop the
farm-to-table cafe and as you can see
that picture in the bottom we were told
that it would be a great place for a
marina and a vineyard phase 3 is a place
to live
now our community already offers the
opportunity to provide great
relationships and real friends but what
we’re trying to create as a give people
a place to call home so that includes a
30 acre housing community that’s going
to serve people inclusively of all
different abilities and it’s something
that our community needs right now and
finally a place to grow what we ought to
offer is not just a horizontal learning
curve we want people to go out and have
everything that they need to be out and
be successful in the greater community
but that also includes a door that’s
always open to come back I don’t know
where I would be without autism it’s
like someone gave me a mission in life
to be the voice for those that didn’t
have one and my brother Chuckie
he’s a non verbal hero his story is
paving the way for a smoother transition
for adults in the future
my mother is currently creating her
legacy so that no family ever has to
walk alone through our struggles through
our struggles we found hope in the
absolute darkest hour but now we’re
holding a torch so that we can empower
others and share these dreams for the
people in this room I want you to know
that you’re not alone that hope is here
and then it’s happening and for my new
friends that I get to meet I want every
one of you to think about changing the
world and we might not be able to change
it at large but we can change it right
here and now and I want you to get on
your bulldozer I want you to find your
own path I want you to knock down any
fear and self-doubt and I want you to be
able to create your own
because you never know where you’re
gonna end up this is my life worth living thank you
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