Since there are many available programs for people with special needs who are not adults, we will restrict the Residents to adults of age 21+. While we expect the demand for the Community to far exceed the number of living units at our first site/project in Sarasota County, Florida, we want to get a sense of the age distribution of that demand. Eventually, we may want to create a Community of Residents of similar age to maximize the likelihood that Residents will share same tastes and preferences in music, recreational activities, and cultural activities organized by the Community.

We do not plan to recruit for any narrow set of need criteria. We may rely on the state or federal criteria for persons with “disabilities”. For example, we expect interest all along the autism spectrum as well as other disabilities.

Yes, onsite vocational training for the work tasks and functions of the feed-in businesses will be a prominent service offering. Our Resident screening will establish trainability for Residents.

The Community will be located near (less than 30 minutes) a full-service hospital. This will allow us to keep costs down by providing non-emergency medical services only on site.

No, it will be the responsibility of the families of the Residents to provide (self or hire) caregiver services. The Community staff will be knowledgeable about caregiver services and can advise families on how to engage caregivers and how to take advantage of available government assistance (financial and in-kind). Staff at SCI or the Community operating company will also be available to assist with Medicare, Medicaid, Disability, and other federal and state programs.

Based on preliminary research we estimate the annual tuition to be in the range of $20 K to $55 K initially, with escalation at or near inflation. $20 K is based on the Promise business model with significant grants from the state of Florida. The $55 K figure is based on the Brookwood business model under which the community seeks almost no outside support from federal, state or local sources. Generally, grants, subsidies… entail greater restrictions imposed on the community.

We want to make the Community as much like residential communities from which the Residents come as possible. Therefore, we will develop a registration/admittance structure that does not tend to penalize Residents who wish to leave the Community. Restrictions on departure will be primarily financial (not excessive). This is why we want to have a rather long waiting list for new Residents.

These are going to be non-profit businesses which are formed as subsidiaries of Special Communities, Inc. Each of these feed-in businesses will be affiliated with a specific Community and a fraction (maybe 25%) of its net revenues will go into a fund owned and controlled by Special Communities, Inc. to support the development of other Communities. Its remaining revenues net of Resident compensation and outside costs will be returned to the non-profit Community Company for the purposes of keeping tuition low or for expanding the scope of services offered by the Community to its Residents.

The Development LLC will form the non-profit Community Company using its legal budget. It is anticipated that the Communities will be wholly owned subsidiaries of the development company as will the feed-in businesses of each community.

A waiting list may consist of potential Residents who have “passed” initial functional (qualified disability) and other (non-violent, not in need of constant medical attention…) screening and who have made binding conditional (tuition being below prescribed level, services actually being provided by Community as promised…) financial commitments to remain on the wait list until summoned because of a new vacancy or because of an expansion of residences within the Community. The waiting list may be “ordered” according to when prospective residents make the binding commitment. We do not expect the financial magnitude to be extreme.

We will attempt to harvest available tax credits or other financial advantages to the Community. Some of these advantages will be attributable to the designs of sustainable infrastructure elements. NC renewable energy credits and other advantages can be found at https://www.dsireusa.org/. Additionally, we will provide information to Residents about available federal, state and local programs which can provide financial assistance to help pay for tuition.