Wheelchair accessibility is expected of businesses and public facilities. Ramps, lifts and elevators are common sights throughout the city. What happens, though, when a person’s own home isn’t wheelchair accessible? Affordable housing can be hard to come by, and medical expenses can pile up.
In situations like these, the Neighborhood Helpers Volunteer Ministry in Soddy-Daisy steps in. A simple collective of retirees and local church-goers, the ministry recently built its 189th ADA-compliant ramp for a local person or family in need. The group funds projects through grants made available through the TVA Retirees Association and similar organizations.
“There’s a fairly large need for them in the area,” Stanley Coffman, one of the volunteers in charge of leading the projects, said of wheelchair ramps. “And since we can get more funding, we can help more people by building ramps.”
The ADA has strict guidelines in regards to code conditions ramps must meet, such as the height of the handrails, slope of the ramp and how far apart leveled sections are. Coffman said there isn’t a typical ramp that they’ve build. Length has varied from as short as six feet to as long as 125 feet, and the exact layout is partially determined by the land on which the ramp is built.
Before putting on a tool belt, Coffman, like most of the group’s volunteers, was a retiree looking for a way to help out his community.