Disability and Progress-September 25, 2025-Wingspan Life Resources

[00:00:00] Speaker A: KPI.org. [00:00:32] Speaker B: Sam. [00:01:00] Speaker A: Greetings. And you're tuned to KFAI 90.3 FM, Minneapolis. And kfai.org you're listening to Disability and Progress. I'm Sam Jasmin. Charlene Dahl, my research PR person, is also with me in the studio. Hello, Charlene. [00:01:15] Speaker B: Hello, everybody. [00:01:17] Speaker A: And before we get started, we want you to know we are in our last week of the pledge drive. We are so wanting your support. And you can reach us at so 612-375-9030 or kfai.org so do what you can and every bit counts. And we also have another guest with us. Of course. We've had him before. He's awesome. We have Hav. Keller Carlstrom. Hello, Keller. [00:01:51] Speaker B: Hello, Sam. Thanks for having me back on. [00:01:53] Speaker A: Thank you so much. Keller is marketing and community engagement specialist for Wingspan Lab Life Resources. And you're going to be sharing information about Wingspan and their Good Neighbor program. Also, all sorts of stuff about Wingspan. So wanting to share about how you're building community and beautifying yards of about 35 group homes throughout the Twin Cities. So thank you again for coming on and talking about this. But first of all, Killer, I think I have some congratulations to do. You have quite a life change in summer this last summer, didn't you? [00:02:37] Speaker B: I did, yeah. Among the biggest you could ask for. Yeah. [00:02:41] Speaker A: Yes. Yes. Well, besides a kid, right? [00:02:44] Speaker B: No kid yet. [00:02:46] Speaker A: But you did get married. [00:02:48] Speaker B: We did get married. [00:02:49] Speaker A: Yeah. So congratulations. [00:02:52] Speaker B: Thank you so much. [00:02:53] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah. So anyway, Killer, I want to talk a little bit about, obviously about Wingspan. So can you tell us, our audience a little bit about what Wingspan's mission is and who you serve? [00:03:12] Speaker B: Yeah. So Wingspan's mission is to inspire community by empowering people impacted by disabilities to live their best life. And wingspans in our 52nd year currently of serving people with developmental and other disabilities. [00:03:28] Speaker A: That's a long time. [00:03:29] Speaker B: All throughout. A very long time. Yep. And we actually just said goodbye to our longtime executive director, Therese, who had been with us at wingspan for 48 years. She's off to a happy retirement. But another big change for us. Yeah. Oh, very much so. Yeah. Amazing. Amazing executive director. But yeah, 48 of our 52 years serving people with disabilities. And we currently care for 130 plus individuals in 35 group homes throughout the Twin Cities. We also have a in home program assisting those living with their families or independently. And though a majority of our clients are older adults, we also have homes where we care for youth age 12 to 17. [00:04:22] Speaker A: Keller, I'm sure I've asked you this before, but I'm thinking of the listeners that have not heard your voice for this is the first time. How did you stumble upon Wingspan and what made you want to go into this type of work? [00:04:37] Speaker B: Thanks for asking. So I stumbled into this just through getting out of a different type of area of work and kind of more HR adjacent in the private sector. I'd done nonprofits, kind of internships and just volunteering throughout my time at college, and I majored in nonprofit administration with an emphasis on public policy. So after I was just kind of done with my my previous job, this caught my eye as I was just looking through indeed plug for indeed was a position opening at Wingspan and hadn't had known really nothing about this industry or the huge need for it in our community. But after meeting with Daralyn and meeting the clients here at Wingspan, Awesome. Darling is the best. It really was just a natural fit and like some of the most rewarding work and amazing people that you can be around. [00:05:44] Speaker A: How long have you been with Wingspan now? [00:05:48] Speaker B: I just celebrated my own three year anniversary in August. [00:05:52] Speaker A: All right. You have a long way to go. [00:05:55] Speaker B: Catching up to Therese. [00:05:59] Speaker A: Yeah. So cool. So tell me a little bit about how Wingspan helps clients live their best life. [00:06:10] Speaker B: Yeah. So Wingspan is very proud to be among the pioneers of what's called person centered planning, which is really foundational to how we help clients live their best lives. Person centered planning, from a client's perspective would be like, for example, you might be an individual who has something like cerebral palsy or down syndrome, something like schizophrenia, autism. You might have any number of comorbid comorbidities. Not easy to say. In the past, like in the days of large institutions, like up until mid late 70s, you might have been treated the same as anybody else who shares your diagnosis, just kind of baseline maintenance and medication and treatment. But you and the person who shares your diagnosis next to you, of course, have different personal preferences, different goals in life. You have different wants and dreams and things you want to get out of each day. [00:07:21] Speaker A: Right. [00:07:23] Speaker B: So person centered planning is just the idea of going beyond treatments and bringing in the client themselves, their guardians, families, case managers, their providers, and going beyond treatment to just discover what each individual person is looking to get out of their time, whether it's at Wingspan or another organization. Do they want to make a friend? Do they want to find a job or a volunteer role? Could they benefit from having an outlet to express themselves through things like music, dance, or art? Which answer is almost always yes. That's what we're here at Wingspan to empower them to find and accomplish those things. [00:08:09] Speaker A: Excellent. So I know there's a lot that goes into that. What kind of training did you have to do when you were coming into work with this? [00:08:26] Speaker B: So for me, my training is mostly just some of the things with some of our software for like donor database, a lot of the accounting side of things. And like, how do you market this mission to people and get in front of as many eyes and ears as possible and really take what like our direct service professionals who are the heart of our mission, what they're seeing every day, what our clients need, what they're going through, and what they could use from the community and what they can give to the community. And finding the message for that is really the training that I went through in the work that I do with Wingspan. But yeah, really the direct service professionals are like the core and the heart of our mission. They go through very intensive training to provide for a client's hygiene, mobility, medications, managing their behaviors, assisting with their job services, cooking, and also that person centered planning of working with them to get out the most of each day and encouraging them to try new things and be out in the community to the extent of their abilities. [00:09:54] Speaker A: Keller, I'm wondering, you guys started something called the Good Neighbor program. Tell us a little bit about that and how it relates to the mission to empower your clients. [00:10:09] Speaker B: Thank you for asking, Sam. So our Good Neighbor program we're very excited about and it's really kind of taking that person centered care that goes on in our group homes within them and expanding it outside as well, because our clients love to go out on their decks, enjoy the summer weather and fall weather. Winter maybe not so much. But we believe that empowering our clients includes making sure their outdoor living spaces are as bright and welcoming to come out to and come home to, just like their neighbors have. So your listeners probably know just how much work goes into maintaining a yard and landscaping. Now imagine multiplying that by 35 homes and growing. So with our direct service professionals engaged with round the clock care inside the homes, we of course don't expect them to be outside doing all the yard work as well. So that's where volunteers are so essential to us and where the Good Neighbor program comes in. So last fiscal year, wingspan had over 270 volunteers. They contributed over 1200 volunteer hours to our mission. Much of that doing yard beautification. Still, just with the luck of the draw, some areas of the cities that our volunteers are coming from, we just don't get all of our homes paid attention to right. Or we had to contract yard services to take care of pressing needs. [00:11:55] Speaker A: So where are a lot of these homes positioned at? Where are they all in Minneapolis or just all around the Twin cities area? [00:12:05] Speaker B: Minneapolis, St. Paul, many kind of in the Richfield Bloomington area. We have one up in New Hope, we have some in Shoreview, Roseville, Arden Hills, Falcon Heights, over in Woodbury Fridley, down in Inver Grove Heights area as well. So kind of really all over the place. [00:12:29] Speaker A: And I do know understand how you know the whole idea. People do even though it's sad, but they do kind of judge you by looking at your yard upkeep sometimes. And so it is nice that when you have a nicely kept outside of your house that you know, it kind of represents that you're part of the neighborhood and you're working hard to try to keep it going good and, and all those good things. So how can people get involved as a wingspan Good neighbor? [00:13:06] Speaker B: Yeah, well, I will let you know but I, I think that's a very good point with just the fact that it, how you present yourself can be so important and yes just the dignity with having a, a well kept yard. And we do get notes from our neighbors which I appreciate because it lets me know that where are areas that we can improve and what our priorities are for getting volunteers here or there. [00:13:36] Speaker A: Right. [00:13:37] Speaker B: And we want to be good neighbors too and not have our Buckthorn going into our neighbor's yards, things like that. So that is part of the Good Neighbor program is not just asking for neighbors to help us but doing what we can to to be good neighbor as well. With that people can get involved in a number of ways. So our website wingspan life.org on our good Neighbor page people can scroll down, read all about the Good Neighbor program. There are links to apply just to express interest in getting involved. There might be a home you might be interested in adopting or you might just want to volunteer. So you might, you could just At a base level. Volunteering twice in one calendar year achieves our first sponsorship level for the Good Neighbor program. And we want to go above and beyond to recognize our continued supporters. Whether it's an individual or corporate team just coming out to volunteer with us and then we have our paid sponsorship levels. We recognize that corporations have many different ways of giving their individual volunteers might give an at will donation after a volunteer event. Some organizations give grants based on their total volunteer hours that they've done with us. Some have options to give it to a Charity of choice with their employee paychecks. So however a business and its employees might support Wingspan, we're very happy to pool all of that and count it all towards a sponsorship level for the business so they can get their due recognition. [00:15:37] Speaker A: So do you actually, I mean, do people actually come over and help with outside chores and stuff with the lawn or do you have them donate so that you can afford for, you know that, that you can have services come and be done on the lawn or do you do both? [00:16:00] Speaker B: It's, it's both. So we have. Really a big part of my job is recruiting volunteers, going out with teams or individuals to each of our 35 group homes and getting kind of wish lists from our house coordinators and direct service professionals. What they see can be done in the yard. What I've seen when I'm out there and doing mulching, raking, weeding, and there are many more things that we want to do but might not have the capacity. So I'll go out there with volunteers and do all that. And this is the Good Neighbor program is really just a way to kind of give those volunteers a way to make a more lasting impact. Whether it's through giving as well or getting recognition for the ones that have come out again and again to help us out and give people away who might not have the capacity the time to come out and be doing that very challenging manual labor. But if they want to give an in kind donation, if they have a tool that they don't use anymore, or some gloves that they don't use anymore, anything extra, they can give those to us that our volunteers can use or with a donation, we're able to do things like just pay for the mulch that we put down at our homes and the compost bags that we use or replace the tools that are getting worn out and old and do some of those wish list projects that we might not be able to get to yet. [00:17:48] Speaker A: Talk a little bit about some highlights of how participants in the Good Neighbor program are recognized. [00:18:00] Speaker B: Yeah, so with our helping Hands sponsorship level, that's the, that's the base. Just volunteer with us twice in a year level, they receive recognition on a sign at our largest fundraising event. They get their name on a plaque wall at our headquarters. They get social media shout outs on the day of their project as well as during National Volunteer Week every April and also get a shout out on, on our annual annual report. So that's just coming back and showing some much appreciated commitments to one of our homes twice during one year that's the recognition volunteers can look forward to. And then with our paid levels, we build upon that with newsletter spotlights, inclusion on event T shirts, things like a good neighbor window decal for your home or your business, and much more than that. But I think one that really stands out is at our $500 level, we put up a lawn sign at the home of your choice saying, this group home adopted by, in parentheses, your business, your family, whatever it may be. And that really, I think, just shows that you take ownership over the amazing work that you've done in the yard and that you want to keep it that way, having your name kind of attached to it. [00:19:34] Speaker A: Yeah. [00:19:34] Speaker B: Yeah. That is kind of cool. [00:19:36] Speaker A: Yeah, that is. That is really cool. I agree, Charlene. And you don't. I mean, people don't realize how much that means to somebody. Even like, I mean, this goes through across all things, I think. You know, sometimes I'll see on the nextdoor app where a neighbor is elderly and they really have a hard time doing some of their lawn work and people reach out and do that. It feels like very much in a similar area that people could reach out and say, hey, you know, I'll take this job and. And I'll do this for you guys for, you know, the summer or whatever. Or, you know, maybe I'll be responsible for helping with this. But for the winter, I'm sure that that means a lot to people who are 501s and all sorts of those types of, you know, especially with all your houses. And I'm sure you get this, Keller. I'm sure that people say, well, I'll. If I donate or give you a sponsorship, what does it go towards? So you must have a list, right? [00:20:46] Speaker B: Yeah. So we have. Over my time of just doing all this volunteer work around or being with volunteers around all the group homes, I, for a long time was building a very mental list of all the things I was seeing that could be repaired or touched up or improved. And that's become a much more materialist. Once I. This idea kind of spawned of actually doing something to specifically fund some of these things. So we have over 20 of our homes. Could definitely use pretty extensive sod or seed projects. Grass seed. At last count, we had over 15 pretty big painting projects like wheelchair ramps, decks and sheds that included probably some repair jobs as well. On. On decks and sheds as well. We as we get kind of bigger volunteer groups and more numerous volunteers just kind of getting a larger supply of tools like loppers and trimmers and being able to Go to two houses at once with big volunteer groups and have the rakes and the supplies to equip all of them and have equipment that actually works. So that's definitely been on the list. And with, with some of the funds initially coming in this year with the Good Neighbor program, that's been some of our first things is just replacing our dull and worn out tools. So a lot of these things are just going towards more efficient, more impactful, broader scope volunteer projects at our homes. One donor gifted us $1,000 worth of GTON's gift cards with a GINS fundraiser that we did. Just an amazing donation that we've now just had a pool to. When any of our house coordinators or direct service professionals or clients express interest in doing some gardening or planting some flowers, we're able to say we've got some gift cards for you. Don't just go out and shop. We can help you out and make sure that it's not coming out of other funds. [00:23:19] Speaker A: That's cool. [00:23:20] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:23:21] Speaker A: And cool for the the clients to be able to do gardening if they want to. [00:23:27] Speaker B: Yeah, that's become a pretty popular just kind of activity for some of our more green thumb minded staff at some of the houses. When clients have expressed interest in that. It's a great shared kind of therapeutic and fun activity to do outdoors. [00:23:47] Speaker A: Oh, and I'm sure it teaches so much, you know, in regards to that kind of thing. I'm wondering, are you, do you know like how, how large is your volunteer? What if somebody said how many volunteers do you generally have throughout the year? Do you know. [00:24:08] Speaker B: While I've been here, it's been anywhere between 200 and nearly 300 volunteers and that is spread out throughout all of our various volunteer activities that we do. With the yard beautification. It probably around 100 or 100 to 150, I'd say. [00:24:32] Speaker A: Gotcha. So I'd like to talk about other volunteer opportunities that I'm sure Wingspan offers. So beyond yard beautification, talk to me about a little bit about more, what people could volunteer for. [00:24:50] Speaker B: Great question. So I would love to have volunteer groups if they maybe want to do yard, be vacation and then something else during the year. I understand wanting to switch it up for your corporate teams or just kind of getting a taste of other stuff. I'd love to have both of those activities count towards a helping hand sponsorship for the Good Neighbor program. And one of our most popular volunteer opportunities is birdhouse painting. So every May, Wingspan has her annual Power of Love gala and included in the silent auction. There are dozens of gourd bird houses painted by our volunteers. So you don't have to be a professional artist or anything to participate in that. We've had corporate teams take like a dozen of them for a painting night with their co workers. Many, many individuals have done it with us for years now. And everyone can log in and see to our online auction and they can see how much their gourd is going for. It's these gourd birdhouses. We just see so many amazing creative designs and multimedia every year. It's new stuff that we're seeing. It's amazing how popular they've become among our donors and our people who come to our gala. [00:26:19] Speaker A: That's really cool. So what makes, what do you feel makes Wingspan unique from other organizations that do similar of what you guys do? [00:26:38] Speaker B: I think with Wingspan it goes back to person centered care and planning. It is things like our staff going above and beyond to do gardening with their clients like we've seen. It goes to our cultural educational programs that we've done out in the community that are free to the public, that allow our clients to mingle with anybody in their community watching the same like Chinese instruments, demonstration, learning the same thing and kind of breaking down those barriers of stigma. It's our programs like our French club or our spoken word and poetry club, which we were the first organization to offer to people with developmental disabilities. And it's things like our Rainbow support group for LGBTQ individuals that we host, also open to the community to participate in along with our clients. So it is, it is that that extra dimension of getting clients opportunities to show us their, what they're capable of, what their abilities are and both surprising us and, and then discovering what's within themselves. I think that's, that's what I appreciate most about what Wingspan does amazingly well and, and uniquely in the community. [00:28:20] Speaker A: And if you were to. Well, first of all, I'm just curious, how many, how many people within a Wingspan house generally are there? How many clients? [00:28:33] Speaker B: That's a great question. So our, when I say group home, it is like you might just walk past a Wingspan home and never know because it's just like any other home in your neighborhood. And we generally have four clients living in a home with direct service professionals there around the clock. And then with our special specialized services homes, it can be more one to two clients with, with higher staffing ratios, just with higher behavioral needs in those homes. [00:29:13] Speaker A: And do you feel like it's been hard keeping staff or getting staff or. Same with Volunteers. Keeping volunteers or getting volunteers. [00:29:25] Speaker B: Yeah. So on the another great question on the staffing side, really a point of emphasis in our industry and has been for decades now and especially, I mean just aggravated by Covid has been a staffing crisis within the industry of care for the disabled folks, people with disabilities within. Well really the nationwide. It's been a crisis. So that, that really comes back to the fact that these industries rely heavily on state funding for being able to pay wages to our direct service professionals and fair wages. And it's a very challenging job. Being a dsp, you're dealing with a lot of high behaviors and things that are very, can be very uncomfortable to work with. Of course, incredibly rewarding. But it is, it has been very tough to find and retain staff in, in this industry for quite some time. It's been a long uphill battle but. And we've seen some wins in recent years, but we're always advocating for more that we can do for our direct service professionals to make sure they're getting their fair due. And turnover can be so impactful on clients not knowing who's caring for them in very intimate ways on a daily basis. Having to regain that trust with someone is a big thing. And with volunteers, I think that was another thing kind of hit by Covid was right. The just desire to. Or just the normalcy of going out and volunteering in groups and, and doing that. But I think it also kind of like after the pandemic kind of wound down more so I think a lot of people kind of were like kind of jonesing for to get out and be volunteering. So we appreciate those people who are very enthusiastic about it. And I think for us like there are the people are out there that want to volunteer. It's just about getting our face in front of them and getting the message out to them. And everybody who's volunteered with so many who have volunteered with us, they. They talk about how glad they were to have like clients and staff come outside and say hello and thank you and watch our clients faces light up when they see how the yard's been transformed or after doing a cooking night with just how happy they are with the experience and. [00:32:32] Speaker A: Right. [00:32:33] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:32:35] Speaker A: So are there any as of now that you know of? Is there anything that you are concerned with possibly being on the legislation chopping block or is it kind of holding its own this coming up? [00:32:53] Speaker B: So there are definitely some concerns with various things coming down the pipeline from a federal level and at a state level with cuts to just the rate increase with disability Waivers in the state of Minnesota. That is a direct impact on how direct service professionals can be paid. So there's definitely some advocating going on with. At. At the state level right now that I'm aware of with like the association of Residential Services in Minnesota arm kind of setting up kind of town halls with representatives just making sure that they're aware that our people are being impacted, our clients are being impacted, the staff that care for them are by not having rates increases to waivers, kind of matching both just cost of living and inflation and also needing to get just increased in general to make it kind of catch up for lost time with making it fair for DSPs and their wages. [00:34:18] Speaker A: Well, Keller, is there anything more you'd like to leave us with? [00:34:24] Speaker B: Yes, I would just say anybody who would love to would like to get in touch with me for inquiries into the Good Neighbor program or any volunteer opportunities can visit our website. Again, that's wingspanlife.org and I would point you to the get involved menu and you can see our volunteer and Good Neighbor pages as well as our advocacy page if you are more interested in getting involved at that. At the public policy level. And there are links on the site to apply for a Good Neighbor sponsorship or express interest in volunteering. And anyone can also feel free to text or email me directly with any questions. Do you mind if I give my number out? [00:35:07] Speaker A: Absolutely not. Go for it. [00:35:10] Speaker B: My number is 701-205-6233. [00:35:16] Speaker A: Do it again. [00:35:18] Speaker B: Again. That's 701-205-6233. And my email is K, K A R L S T R O M as in [email protected] that's kcarlstromgspanlife.org so that's so funny. [00:35:42] Speaker A: On a side Note, Keller, that 701, I happen to know, I believe it was the North Dakota area code. Are you from there? [00:35:51] Speaker B: Very close. I'm from Moorhead. Might have bought my phone in Fargo. [00:36:01] Speaker A: I used to work at a job that had to know the area codes so I wouldn't call people back for their tech support too early. Oh, funny. Now you. It doesn't matter now. You can never know because people are everywhere. The cell phones, now, you just don't know. They might be. They might have a North Dakota number, but they live in Hawaii. Whatever. [00:36:24] Speaker B: That's a good party skill. You can guess where everybody's from. [00:36:28] Speaker A: It is, isn't it? It is, isn't it? Well, Keller, it's been great. Thank you so very, very much for coming on. [00:36:37] Speaker B: Thank you so much, Sam. I appreciate this. Always fun. [00:36:40] Speaker A: Good luck and keep in touch. [00:36:43] Speaker B: Will do. Thank you. [00:36:49] Speaker A: You're tuned to KFAI 90.3 FM, Minneapolis, and KFEI.org the views expressed on this show are not necessarily those of KFEI or its board of directors. My name is Sam. I've been the host of this show. Charlene Dahl is my research PR person. You can email us and find us at disabilityandprogressamjasmond.com Tonight we're speaking with Keller Carlstrom, who is a marketing and communication engagement specialist for Wingspan Life Resources. This is KFAI 90.3 FM and kfai.org thanks so much for listening. Take care.