22 - Prairie Post West - Friday, February 26, 2021


Best of the Best Family struggling to hold onto dream of employing people with disabilities


BY GREG BOBINEC ALBERTA NEWSPAPER GROUP A local southern Alberta family is struggling to hold onto the prop- erty they have been working towards developing as a place to help employ people with disabilities, and is asking for the community’s support to save it. Since moving from their successful greenhouse in Barons several years ago, Suzie Irwin and her husband Brandt moved to Lethbridge to open a flower shop and coffee shop with plans to later open the greenhouse. The dream of a greenhouse to help people with disabilities was cut short after the contractor they hired declared bankruptcy and took their money. Years later, family friend Karlie Puchala launched a GoFundMe to revive the project and save the property. “About seven years I went into the family’s flower shop and I was buying a gift for a family I worked with and their son had autism, and I got chatting with Suzie and she shared that she also had a son with autism, so we got chatting about the gap in society with supporting people with disabilities with meaningful employment,” says Puchala.


“I used to drive past Park Lake and see this abandoned barn and


greenhouse and wondered what the story was behind that, and Suzie shared with me that it was hers and that in the year 2000, they relocated from Barons where they ran a successful greenhouse and they hired this contractor who was recommended to them be- cause they had experience moving old barns. So they hired him and shortly after things started to go south. They noticed that materials would go missing, he wasn’t showing up on the job, and shortly after he declared bankruptcy and took hundreds of thousands of dollars of their money.”


With hundreds of thousands of dollars gone from the families’ ac- counts, the family had to step up and find ways to make ends meet. “The family was forced to do a double mortgage, the father Brandt has worked full-time and then Suzie, she ran Panda Flowers and now runs a local shop on the west side of Lethbridge because they couldn’t keep up with the franchise fees,” says Puchala. “During this time, Suzie was also working at Safeway as a phar- macy tech and she got injured on the job and lost the job.” Once the pandemic hit the province, the troubles with the green- house continued to pour in, and with many attempts to fix and improve the situation, the road seemed bleak. “COVID hit and basically their bank accounts were frozen, they


were unable to pay their mortgage, and their one daughter took out a personal loan to help pay their mortgage and the bank wouldn’t accept it,” says Puchala. “Then they received a notice there was going to be a foreclosure on


the property and together we have worked to get an extension put in place, so we have until April 27 to either find a new mortgage, we have tried to meet with private lenders but with COVID it’s too high of a risk, tried to get in touch with other banks, but because the bank ruined her credit, she can’t get a new mortgage.” With the extension on foreclosure, Puchala stepped up to the plate to try to raise as much money to help them lessen the payment owed back. With a goal of $350,000, so far they have managed to raise just under $4,000. “We are trying to raise money through the GoFundMe to help in any way towards lessening the payment that is owed back to the bank to be able to apply for a new mortgage on the property,” says Puchala. “This property is slipping from under us right now and the number of people that go out to Park Lake every year, it’s a great location with so much potential.”


With the Irwin’s son’s disability and hard time finding meaning-


ful work, and Puchala’s experience and education with disabilities, they are hoping to get the funding to create not only an encouraging space to foster skills and a workforce for people with disabilities, but also as a community space that so many people pass by every year. “I used to work at an agency where we had a Youth Readiness


program and a huge gap that I saw was getting kids through the program and then employed and for some reason Lethbridge has a bad rap for kids with disabilities and working, I am not sure why,” says Puchala.


“The thing with Suzie’s son, he has worked at many places but they were never fully able to support where he was at, he needs that extra support. The main goal with the greenhouse is to foster people with disabilities and employment, Ethan looks at this at his last shot at being able to have that meaningful life and we want him to be able to work.


“Not only that, we want to find individuals like Ethan in the com- munity to come try it out here, get some job experience, we want to create it to also be an outreach community to connect them to other employers.”


Along with the greenhouse, the Irwin’s also plan to use their


coffee shop – Petals, Paws and Beans, as well as their flower shop, New Hope YQL Floral & Botanical, as another safe and encouraging working space for those with disabilities. “The greenhouse will allow for a slower paced environment, the flower shop will give them the opportunity to get that hands-on job experience and a bit faster paced like the coffee shop, but we want to meet people where they are at,” says Puchala. If you are interested in donating to the New Hope at Park Lake Go- FundMe, by April 27 visit gofundme.com/f/new-hope-at-park-lake.


COMPUTER STORE 1.London Drugs 2.Best Buy 3.Costco


CELLULAR STORE 1.Bell


2.Best Buy 3.London Drugs


CAR STEREO STORE 1.Visions Electronics 2.Iasity Sound 3.Stay Tuned


CAMERA STORE


1.McBain Camera 2.London Drugs 3.Best Buy


ENDODONTIST 1.Dr. Cole Barnett


2.Dr. Richard Harder 3.Dr. James Jensen


TANNING SALON 1.Cherry Ice 2.Fabutan


3.Organic Tan


SPA


1.Shear Persuasion 2.Catwalk Salon 3.Brio Salonspa


SMOOTHIE/JUICE BAR 1.Booster Juice 2.Orange Julius


3.Reflex Supplements


PHYSIOTHERAPIST COMPANY 1.Elements Physical Therapy 2.Peak Physical


3.Lethbridge Physiotherapy ORTHODONTIST


1.Gibb Orthodontic 2.Devon Kutsch


3.Downtown Orthodontic OPTOMETRIST


1.Dr. Fran Tatebe


2.Dr. Len Ferguson 3.Dr. George Day


OPTICAL STORE


1.Professional Optical 2.Optical Studio 3.Costco


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52  |  Page 53  |  Page 54  |  Page 55  |  Page 56  |  Page 57  |  Page 58  |  Page 59  |  Page 60  |  Page 61  |  Page 62  |  Page 63  |  Page 64