With organizations like The Telling Project, The Combat Paper Project and The Art of War Project, art has helped many veterans cope with returning to civilian life. But there’s another group that can struggle as much as vets: their caregivers. So a writing workshop program is offering classes and mentorship for military family members to turn their experience into poetry and prose as well.
The Helen Deutsch Writing Workshops, sponsored by the New York-based Writers Guild of America East Foundation, were initially offered to wounded veterans in 2008 and 2009, kicking off with meetings in Columbus, Ohio and San Francisco. Starting in 2011, the organization partnered with the Wounded Warrior Project to sponsor writing classes taught by professional writers (some of whom are veterans) for the caregivers of permanently injured veterans.
The workshops are not therapy — they’re focused on teaching the participants how to craft stories, essays and poems, but many participants find that the writing process helps ease their suffering and sense of isolation.
Sandra Hemenger, whose husband was injured in Iraq, attended a New York City caregivers workshop. “I began to write a book about everything that has happened to us in the past four years,” she tells the Writers Guild of America. “Although I still do not have a lot of time to write, I have a new found love for writing that I never knew existed. For some, they would say our story has taken a bad turn but to us it feels as if the bricks were taken off our chest and we can breathe again. My husband has sensed a change in me since I have been writing. I am no longer keeping everything bottled up inside and I have become a better person because of it.”
Andrea W. Doray of the Denver Post spoke to one of the mentors in the program, Seth Brady Tucker, an Iraq veteran and author of the memoir “Mormon Boy” and the poetry collection “We Deserve the Gods We Ask For.” Tucker led a workshop this month in Denver for participants from around the country, and for the next six months, he’ll continue to assist them with their writing projects.
Tucker tells Doray that as he worked with the caregivers, he struggled “not to break down and cry every 10 minutes,” but he’s hopeful that the writing process that’s helped him since serving as an airborne paratrooper will also enhance the lives of his students.
MORE: How Storytelling Can Bridge the Military-Civilian Divide
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When the Elderly Need Help With Chores, This Concierge Service Does the Heavy Lifting
Who has time to launch a start-up while she’s still finishing her bachelor’s degree?
Somehow, 25-year-old Amanda Cavaleri of Denver, Colo. did, building on inspiration she received during a year off from school.
Six years ago, Cavaleri was torn about what to major in: classics or business? So she took some time off and worked as a server at The Academy, a Boulder, Colo. retirement community.
Cavaleri tells Claire Martin of the Denver Post that one woman at The Academy couldn’t communicate well, though she could indicate yes or no. “I was serving coffee and tea one day, and I noticed that she always had the same kind of tea. I wondered if she might be bored with it, and might want to try a new kind. So I brought over all the tea choices, so she could pick the tea she preferred. It made such a difference to her. Who knows how long she’d had to drink that same tea? And I knew I’d found my passion.”
Cavaleri began to dream up a business plan for a concierge service for the elderly — a company that would help clients with chores and errands, especially those who live far away from their family members, while connecting millennials with senior citizens.
Soon, she founded Capable Living, a start-up she runs while finishing her bachelor’s degree in business at Regis University.
Capable Living offers help to elders with day-to-day chores, post-surgery needs and travel. And Calaveri has become one of the leading lights of the eldercare industry.
As for her future plans, Calaveri tells Martin, “One of the problems we’re trying to solve is how to get high school and college grads to work with elders, at least for a couple of years, so the younger people can get the benefit of the elders’ experience…There’s such talent out there, and so much potential. How do we shift our attitude toward aging so that we, as a society, value elders’ experiences? We need a cultural paradigm shift.”
MORE: These Startups Offer Sleek Technological Innovations for the Elderly
A Nonprofit Specializing in Second Chances Gives One to an Aurora Theater Shooting Victim
After Marcus Weaver graduated from college, he landed in jail — a bumpy start to adulthood resulting from poor choices that he came to recognize were influenced by growing up with an abusive stepfather.
Weaver became determined to turn his life around, so when he was released from jail about eight years ago, he went to live at New Genesis, a transitional housing space in Denver. “They offered me a job,” he tells Elizabeth Hernandez of the Denver Post, “and I didn’t screw it up.”
Weaver did much more than just not screw up — he began to help his fellow shelter residents find job placements, clothes for work and places to live. Through his efforts, Weaver connected with DenverWorks, a nonprofit that helps find employment for low-income people with disabilities, criminal records and past addictions. The organization found a job for Weaver: working for them as a mentor to others.
“It felt really great, like this was my purpose,” he says. “If you can give a person a job, that changes everything for them. I felt really good for the first time in my life.”
But then on July 20, 2012, Weaver decided to see the premier of the film “The Dark Knight Rises” with a friend. Chaos erupted when a gunman opened fire inside the theater, killing Weaver’s friend, Rebecca Wingo, and shooting Weaver in the arm.
The trauma of losing his friend and suffering a serious injury on that horrific night rattled him, and he was unable to continue his job. Finally he went to therapy and was diagnosed with PTSD.
Even though Weaver’s arm is still not healed — another surgery is scheduled for November — in March he felt ready to apply for jobs. He found himself back at DenverWorks and now serves as their outreach coordinator since the nonprofit believed that everything he’d been through would make him a big asset mentoring people trying to right their lives after suffering hard knocks.
“I see a lot of my former self in the people I’m helping. You see them change. Get a suit, get an interview, get the job. It’s so important,” says Weaver.
Currently finishing up a degree in nonprofit management, Weaver hopes it might lead to starting his own nonprofit. However lofty his goals, anyone familiar with Marcus Weaver’s life story knows it would be foolish to ever count him out.
MORE: No Longer Afraid: A Young Immigrant Victim of the Aurora Theater Shooting Steps Out of the Shadows
This Army Vet Has Driven 165,000 Miles to Help His Fellow Soldiers Receive Medical Care
Prowers County, Colo. sits in the rural southeast corner of the state on the Kansas border, more than four hours away from Denver. Its remote locale makes it difficult for the elderly and disabled veterans who live there to get to their far-flung medical appointments.
Luckily, these American heroes can count on champion volunteer driver Cliff Boxley, who doesn’t hesitate to set out at 4 a.m. — sometimes up to four days a week — to bring them to their doctors’ appointments in Denver, Pueblo, La Junta and Colorado Springs.
Boxley himself served in the Army from 1972 to 1980 and has kept close to his fellow vets, in part through his serving of four terms on the Board of Governors for the First Cavalry Division Association.
In 2007, he started driving veterans in Prowers County to their medical appointments and has since racked up more than 6,000 volunteer hours — driving a total 165,000 miles in that time.
“I started driving because I got a call from Carol Grauberger one day. She was the person who started this service in Prowers County for the veterans. That was seven years and over 150,000 miles ago,” he tells Russ Baldwin of The Prowers Journal.
For all those hours on the road, Boxley was honored with the 2014 AARP Andrus Award for Colorado, which is given to outstanding volunteers making a difference in the lives of seniors from each state.
“Rural veterans tend to be short-changed when it comes to VA healthcare, with few advocates for them in this region. In the military, we always took care of each other, so this is my way of doing that,” Boxley tells Baldwin.
MORE: This Special Volunteer Has Spent More Than 150,000 Miles Behind The Wheel Helping Vets
5 Very Simple, Practical Things You Can Do to Curb Climate Change
Climate change is a defining issue of our time and there is no time to lose,” proclaimed Ban Ki-moon, United Nations Secretary-General, during last month’s U.N. Climate Summit. “There is no Plan B because we do not have a Planet B.”
Since you’ve already converted from a gas-guzzling SUV and always BYOB (bring your own bag) to the supermarket, try making these tweaks to your everyday lifestyle. They’ll help the U.N. achieve its goal of keeping the earth’s temperature from rising no more than 2 degrees Celsius by 2100 and, in turn, keep the planet from facing even more disasters like famine, disease and water shortages.
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For Those Most in Need of Low Utility Bills, There’s Free Solar Energy
Normally, the families that can afford solar panels are the ones who are least in need of the energy savings that accompany the green technology. But now, a new program in Denver is giving some low-income households free access to solar energy.
The charter elementary school Academy 360 (80 percent of its students qualify for free or reduced lunch) in Denver’s Montbello neighborhood focuses on health and wellness in its curriculum and provides wholesome breakfasts and lunches to all its students and encourages plenty of exercise. And now, the new solar program, which was announced by Denver Mayor Michael Hancock last month, should bring more overall wellness (not to mention budget savings) to the families of each of the 125 students enrolled in the school.
Last year, Colorado became the first state to give people the option of accessing solar energy by subscribing to a solar garden connected to their houses via an energy grid, rather than purchasing and installing their own solar panels. This type of thing isn’t legal in every state, but four years ago Colorado legislators passed the Community Solar Act, allowing for partnerships between solar and electrical companies.
The first two solar gardens were located in Colorado Springs, and now a company called SunShare is bringing this option to Denver. The first subscribers will receive six-tenths of a kilowatt of solar energy and should see their home energy bills reduced by twenty percent, according to Anthony Cotton of the Denver Post.
“When I was your age, I used to see these magical solar panels on houses, and I wondered what they did,” Mayor Hancock said as he spoke to the Academy 360 community. “They were very expensive to have then, and they still are. But because of this project, we’ll all be able to share in affordable energy.”
SunShare CEO David Amster-Olszewski tells the Post that he thinks the program will bring a variety of benefits for the Academy 360 families: “It means they’ll be able to put healthier foods on the table or buy more sports equipment for their kids’ health.”
MORE: The Gridiron Goes Green
When Communication Barriers Prevented Coworkers from Talking, Goodwill Provided Language Lessons for All
Back in 2006, when Rafael Toquinto, Jr. started working at a warehouse in Denver where Goodwill Industries sorts unsold clothing and household goods for recycling, his coworkers wouldn’t even say hello to him.
The snub wasn’t on purpose. His fellow employees simply didn’t know how to greet him in a way he’d understand.
Why? Because Toquinto, Jr. is deaf.
But now, he and the 16 other deaf Goodwill employees can enjoy some water cooler chatter with their coworkers — thanks to a free class the nonprofit is offering all employees.
Nicki Cantin, a recycling operations assistant who oversees the warehouse where Toquinto works as a certified forklift driver, said that managers were worried that if there was an emergency, they wouldn’t be able to alert deaf employees about it. “We’re supposed to be working as a team, but we couldn’t even talk to each other,” Cantin told Thad Moore of the Denver Post.
For the past two months, warehouse workers have met twice a week for an American Sign Language class taught by Cathy Noble-Hornsby, deaf services program manager for Goodwill Industries of Denver. Toquinto and other hearing-impaired employees work together with their coworkers, helping to teach them sign language and correcting their hand positions. They also demonstrate a sign when a coworkers finger spells what they want to say.
“We’re not outsiders anymore,” Toquinto told Moore.
Toquinto even makes sure his coworkers practice. When they interact with him on the job and lapse into writing what they want to say to him on paper, “I’ll go, ‘OK, enough writing now,'” Toquinto said. “Now come into my world.”
Toquinto trained a new deaf coworker, Josue Candelaria-Facio, on the ins and outs of the warehouse, such as where everything goes — something that Toquinto struggled to learn in the days before all the coworkers could communicate. “I really feel kind of proud that they’re willing to learn my language,” Candelaria-Facio told Moore. “It’s really nice — even on that basic level — to be able to communicate.”
MORE: How 3D Printing Can Teach Blind Kids to Read
Cities or Suburbs: Which Area is Seeing a Population Boom?
Close your eyes and picture idyllic tree-lined streets in a cheery suburban neighborhood. If you open your eyes, however, you might still see that image — only there might be a lot of “for sale” signs posted in front yards or dark houses due to vacancy.
That’s because cities are now seeing a population influx. According to census analysis by William Frey of the Brookings Institution, this could be the decade of big-city growth.
Analyzing data from 2010-2013, Frey was able to figure out that cities themselves — not just their metropolitan areas — grew at a measurably faster rate than suburbs, with “primary cities” (those with a population over 1 million) growing 1.13 percent from 2011 to 2012. At the same time, suburban areas grew at only .95 percent.
While the difference (and growth rate itself) may seem minimal, it reflects more significant changes that are happening in a select number of cities such as New Orleans; Washington, D.C.; San Jose, California; Austin, Texas; Raleigh-Cary, North Carolina; Denver; and Seattle. All those cities have even faster growth rates even faster than the national average!
Although there are a variety of reasons that people may be migrating back to cities, one that we’ve mentioned before is the rise of the innovation district – urban areas that are easily accessible and combine a variety of organizations and people advancing ideas and promoting ingenuity. These areas attract not only jobs, but because of their cosmopolitan and integrated feel, residents too.
Another specific driver of growth could be the new transportation initiative in Minneapolis-St. Paul, another booming city, according to City Lab.
So, does this mean the demise of white picket fences and two-car garages? Hardly. As the study points out, the suburbs are continuing to grow, albeit at a slower pace. But with growth, comes innovation — giving cities the upper hand.
What’s Helping More Refugees Than Ever Build Businesses in Colorado?
In many states across the country, the economy is picking up after the long recession, making aspiring entrepreneurs eager to launch their small businesses. The only problem? Requirements for loans from traditional banks are still strict, leaving potential business owners, including many immigrants who may not have the credentials banks are looking for, with no capital to start their ventures.
In Colorado, the solution to this crunch has come through several microloan nonprofits that are able to lend smaller amounts than commercial banks do, and serve a wider variety of people, including refugees who want to open shops, home childcare businesses and restaurants.
Denver-based Somali refugee Abdullahi Shongolo was one beneficiary of these programs. Three years ago, a microloan enabled him to buy an international grocery store, leaving him with a rosy view of his adopted country. “If you try, this is America—you can,” Shongolo told Thad Moore of the Denver Post. “This is the country that went to the moon, man.”
According to Moore, microlending is booming in Colorado. Community Enterprise Development Services, a lender specializing in helping immigrants and refugees, increased the number of borrowers in the most recent fiscal year by 150 percent. None of the 51 loans the nonprofit has made since it opened in 2010 has defaulted.
“Refugees do not only bring a few bags of clothes and a few belongings,” Suleyman Abbgero, who used a microloan to open a coffee kiosk in an Aurora mall, told Moore. “They also bring a lot of ideas. If they are given the opportunity, they can do much more.”
MORE: From Field Hands to Farmers: This Program Helps Latino Immigrants Become Land Owners
Could Denver’s Light Rail System be The Future of Public Transit?
As more urban planners across the country brace for a future where cities are densely populated, local officials are turning their attention to investing in enhancing public transit. And even historically car-centric cities like Denver are getting on board.
The Western hub has spent the last decade planning an ambitious blueprint for a major regional light rail system. Denver’s FasTracks program first was defeated in a 1997 referendum only to return in 2004, when voters got behind the $4.7 billion project to add 121 miles of commuter and light-rail tracks, 18 miles of bus rapid transit lanes, 57 new rapid transit stations and 21,000 park-and-ride spots, according to the Atlantic CityLab.
Now a decade later, the Regional Transportation District (RTD), metro Denver’s rail provider, boasts the makings of one of the nation’s greatest public transit systems. Although a work in progress, last year FasTracks introduced the West Rail Line, which runs through some of Denver’s lowest income communities to its terminus in Jefferson County. The program is aiming to expand the East Rail Line to the airport and the Gold Line out west to Arvada by 2016, both powered by overheard catenary wires. Local officials are also targeting 2016 to add a bus-rapid transit system to the university community of Boulder.
Nine of the 10 FasTracks lines are projected to be completed by 2018, connecting 3 million spread across 2,340 square miles, and will include 18 miles of bus rapid transit and 95 stations.
“You’ll wheel your suitcase out of Denver International Airport, ride the train to Union Station, and hop a Car2Go — or even a B-Cycle if you’re traveling light — to your house or hotel. All using one card,” said Phil Washington, RTD’s general manager.
While the city remains a car-heavy town — only about 6 percent use bus or light rail — daily light-rail boardings shot up 15 percent between 2012 and 2013. Though cars are still a mainstay, more residents are embracing the potential.
“From the start, we made it clear we weren’t competing with the car,” Washington said. “And we explained, to the average Joe, that for only four cents on most ten dollar purchases, he’d be getting a whole lot of new transportation.”
Melinda Pollack, a founding member behind local nonprofit Mile High Connects has become a system supporter. Her group coordinates efforts to bring affordable development near transit, and hopes to build 2,000 units of affordable housing near the forthcoming stations in the next 10 years.
“When all the lines open, it’s really going to change connectivity for people,” she said. “We’re trying to make sure that low-income people don’t get pushed away from the stations.”
Indeed, FasTracks investment has seen an addition of 7 million square feet of new office space, 5.5 million square feet of new retail and 27,000 new residential units, The downtown area has increased its residential population 142 percent to 17,500 people since 2000.
“The system is developing and merging,” said University of Denver transportation scholar Andrew Goetz. “ The connectivity we’re going to see as a result is going to be quite impressive.”
Could Denver outpace the transit-praised cities of Portland or Washington, D.C.? By building an expansive system that not only serves urban areas but reaches the sprawling outlying communities where commuters work, Denver officials are not only betting on yes, they’re aiming to reshape American public transit system.
MORE: 5 Gorgeous New High-Speed Rail Stations Coming to the U.S.