Weather | Sports | Forums | Comics | Classifieds | Calendar | Movies

Where learning is served daily

A new community program gives developmentally disabled adults a chance to socialize while polishing their life skills.

SPRING HILL - Welcome Friends," is labeled brightly in white on the front door. A stylized rendition of a casual table and chairs is illustrated on a front glass window.

Inside the storefront at St. Lucy's Plaza along U.S. 19, between Forest Oaks and Berkeley Manor boulevards, Arc Nature Coast has opened a Community Cafe, its first-ever home-away-from-home for its 40 developmentally disabled adult clients who are learning to cope in the community.

The half-dozen patio tables and chairs, and cheery, sunshine yellow walls give the place a cafe atmosphere. To complete the picture, on Wednesday afternoon several diners finished their fast-food lunches, while others ate home-cooked meals.

Cheerful conversation overlaid muted background music. As the television sat dark and silent, a dozen people chatted enthusiastically about the morning's bowling outing, a tournament with Arc's sister organization in Pasco County. Half of the group wore royal blue bowling shirts emblazoned with "Achievers," the name of their bowling league.

The nonprofit Arc Nature Coast works to make its clients employable and self-sufficient. Staff teach the developmentally disabled how to count money, tell time, respond politely in social situations, provide an appropriate tip for a meal, cook for themselves, "all the things we (others) learned as kids," said Christine DeBlasio, who is in charge of the cafe, an acronym for Community Access for Everyone.

Before the Community Cafe opened, Arc staffers accompanied clients on skill-learning forays into the community, helping them make purchases and count change at retail counters. Staffers would teach clients how to tell time by instructing them to rendezvous in a half-hour. They also tutored them how to use computers at Hernando County Library branches, DeBlasio said.

With the new gathering place, skills can be taught in a comfortable setting before clients venture into a challenging world. When DeBlasio asked the lunch crowd if they sometimes get nervous in learning situations out in the community, she was greeted with definitive nods.

Clients endorse the new approach of the cafe and the opportunity to interact with their peers. Ann Jaman said she gets to "socialize," recounting how she'd made two new friends during the morning's bowling tournament.

Client Jasper Dutton appreciates the convenience of working on a computer at the cafe. A shelf on a long side wall holds four working computers. With their own computer center, it's easier to explain computer functions in a louder voice, which is sometimes necessary for hearing-impaired clients, DeBlasio said. In a library computer lab, you have to speak quietly so as not to disturb other computer users, she said.

In a backroom, client Larry Orange helped Arc staffer Buddy Crowe assemble a storage cabinet for the cafe. It was a hands-on payback for what the cafe's five staffers are teaching Orange: handwriting skills, job application writing, budgeting, and mall shopping.

"I'm working to get a job," Orange said, as he inserted brackets to support the shelves.

Manager DeBlasio hopes that as word gets out about the Community Cafe, more developmentally disabled people will take advantage of the center and its opportunities.

Prospective participants in the Community Cafe would first have to get approval from the program in which they are enrolled, DeBlasio said. Once that is done, state funds would pay for clients.

"If they're on a (state) program, they can get to us," DeBlasio said.

Inquiries for participation should be directed to Service Coordinator Linda Bodo, phone 544-2322, extension 125.