Boscawen, New Hampshire is home to the first Easy Living residential home in the state. It’s designed to meet the needs of people with disabilities.
The newly constructed house has spacious halls, easy-to-use fixtures and even a wheelchair ramp in the garage.
New Hampshire Public Radio’s Dan Gorenstein went to the open house and files this report.
Sfx: room sound
First Jeff Dickinson noticed the smooth walkway up to the house.
Then he appreciated the absence of a cumbersome threshold.
But what he really liked were the lever-style doorknobs.
T.22
3:01 it’s a small thing, but it’s a really important thing...
Dickinson has a form of muscular dystrophy.
He can’t walk, or stand and struggles to grasp things.
...Sometimes people don’t think about door hardware, but you can’t turn the knob, you can’t get into the house.
T.22
3:59 as we go along, we see more lever handles...as far as the light switches, they are the rocker style, instated of the more traditional one....I know at my house, we have similar switches and they are nice b/c I can turn them on with my shoulder, or my head or whatever.
This just-built home in Boscawen makes Dickinson feel welcome.
Wide 4ft. halls help him avoid banging his 300lb. power wheelchair or his body into the walls.
These features are part of the standards required by the Easy Living Program.
A few years ago, a group of private and public organizations developed building criteria to make new homes both accessible and affordable.
The program requires builders get their blueprints certified as Easy Living Homes by authorized organizations.
Granite State Independent Living has been approved to certify such plans.
Executive Director Clyde Terry says there’s a real need for more accessible homes.
T.18
:31 there’s changing demographics in NH. And the need to adjust our infrastructure, our housing stock to to address the changing needs of our population....there are more elderly people who desire to live with their friends, families, and neighbors.
In fact Barbara and John Walderon , a married couple in their late 60’s, poked their head into the open house.
Barbara’s got diabetes and expects to be in a wheelchair soon.
John says he wants to move to a house that he can be in till the end.
2:46 I am very independent. The last place I want to go to si the nursing home. I will stick it out to the end...going to the nursing home, is the last step before they start throwing the dirt on you....He’s luckier than me. I have diabetes and have a lot of ailments that go along with it.
3:20 I can’t do stairs...my movements in my legs are very bad...even coming up this hill was a killer for me.
The Easy Living Home is billed as not only accessible, but affordable.
This particular home is listed at $299,000.
Granite State Independent Living’s Sarah Denoncourt says future easy living homes can cost a little less- but people wanted to show this one off.
2:33 we were trying to make this one as plush as possible so we could get it out there and say, hey, this is what you can do and still make it- when people walk into it, they don’t feel like they are walking into a house that is built for someone else b/c it’s really something that anyone can come in and use...and appreciate.
According to the builder, the cheapest he could construct an easy living home would be around $240,000.
That may be affordable for a couple that is retiring, but that may be a real reach for someone on disability.
Denoncourt says that Granite State Independent Living can work with people to try to find grants and other government assistance.
Jeff Dickinson- who is also a Granite State Independent Living employee- says he couldn’t afford it.
But he says it’s really important to have a place where you can comfortably live.
T.27
5:30 regardless of whether it is the house we are in now, or this house, one of the things I still love about our house, is the feeling I get when I am driving home. I get closer...i take that last turn...and I...see our cute little yellow Cape, with a white picket fence out in front. And I always feel myself relax, cause I am home.
Dickinson says at age 36, he’s gotten used to fighting the lack of access in public...but he says, when you’re home, that should be the one place where you don’t have to worry about it.
For NHPR News, I’m DG.
