Osprey Village, disabled benefit from afternoon of bowling at Station 300
Lindsay Persoon picked through bowling balls while she waited for a lane to clear at Bluffton's Station 300, lifting each contender and swinging her arm slowly to test her grip.
"I need something smaller," Persoon, 26, said as she discarded a dark purple ball. "I have little hands."
As a two-time bowling competitor in the Special Olympics, Persoon, who has Down syndrome, is serious about the sport.
However, most people filling Station 300 on Sunday night were just having fun. They ate, bowled, bid on more than 80 auction items and watched the Pro Bowl to raise money for Osprey Village Inc., a nonprofit that plans to create a community where adults with and without developmental disabilities can live together.
Sponsors filled all 24 lanes, decked in their company T-shirts, including a group of nine employees from RCH Construction in Bluffton.
As her teammates shouted with each frame, part-owner Heidi Collar said the family business supports the idea of Osprey Village and is friends with the fundraiser's host, Pro Bowl MVP and former Cincinnati Bengals quarterback Ken Anderson.
"It's just being part of the community," Collar said.
The second annual Pro Bowl Open fundraiser was presented by Charter One Realty.
David Green, Osprey Village's development and operations director, said about 120 people attended Sunday's event, which he expects will raise at least $23,000.
That progress is particularly encouraging to 41-year-old Jeremy Hall, whose late father first envisioned an inclusive community in Bluffton where adults with disabilities could live with relative independence but with support from their families and others who chose to live out their retirement in such a neighborhood.
That concept, created in 2008 and now called Osprey Village, recently found its future home, a 38-acre plot on Bluffton Parkway just south of Buckwalter Place.
Hall, who has high-functioning autism, says he'll be happy to move into the village as soon as it opens -- a much better option, he says, than moving into a group home in Charleston, Columbia or Georgia.
"We don't want to go four or five hours from our families," he said. "We want to be near our families so they can help us and we can help them. It's better that way, if you think about it."
The mission struck a chord with Sandy Smith, who lives part-time on Hilton Head Island but has a younger sister with Down syndrome in Maryland.
When Smith, 64, saw an ad for the fundraiser on TV, she thought, 'Oh my gosh, this is what my mom wanted' -- a village-like community where adults with developmental disabilities can live on their own.
"Even though I won't be able to take advantage of it, I want it for here," Smith said.
Some of the families in attendance Sunday night are already committed to living in the Buckwalter Place community.
Taylor Burch, who bowled Sunday night despite being legally blind as a result of a brain tumor, said he has tried living alone but found it too difficult.
The 26-year-old said he would sometimes mix things up when cooking or cleaning. Worse, he was sometimes taken advantage of.
He now has a guide dog to help him get around, but at Osprey Village, he could finally strike a balance between support, family and normalcy.
"I'd have the freedom to live my own life, but in a safe environment," Burch said. "It's always been what I wanted."
Follow reporter Rebecca Lurye on Twitter at twitter.com/IPBG_Rebecca.
Related content:
- Community planned for adults with disabilities finds a home in Bluffton, December 4, 2015
This story was originally published January 31, 2016 at 8:55 PM with the headline "Osprey Village, disabled benefit from afternoon of bowling at Station 300."