An adult day program in Middlebury is expanding its services to families in Chittenden and Rutland counties, with help from a state grant.
Project Independence provides daytime medical and social support to more than 150 older adults a year, while offering family caregivers short-term relief to rest or tend to other needs.
Administrators are using a $233,000 Mobility and Transportation Innovations Grant from the Vermont Agency of Transportation to expand the program's reach, said Kristin Bolton, executive director of Elderly Services, which operates Project Independence.
According to Bolton, $200,000 of the VTrans grant has been used to purchase two new, electric-powered, fully accessible vans that can each hold up to eight passengers. The rest of the grant will pay for drivers and additional staff, she said.
“I wanted to help people who don't drive and for whom there are not good existing transportation systems, or services,” Bolton said.
Beginning in January, the vans will make daily trips to Chittenden and Rutland counties, parts of the state that Bolton said are underserved when it comes to adult respite care.
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Since 2020, five adult day programs have closed in Vermont, including two in Chittenden County, and one in Rutland. InterAge, which had operated for decades in Rutland, was the only adult day program in the county when it closed during the pandemic.
Bolton said the expansion should provide families with more options.
“For example, we have a veteran who lives in Pittsford. He’s in a wheelchair and his wife doesn’t drive,” Bolton said. Because he lives outside Addison County, she said there hasn’t been an easy way for him to get to Project Independence.
The vans could change that.
“I’m sure we can help him out and give his wife some time to take a break from caregiving,” she said.
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Care at Project Independence costs about $26 an hour, though Bolton said they work with clients to see if they qualify for transportation scholarships or Veterans Administration or Medicaid benefits.
Administrators are still figuring out where the vans will stop to pick up passengers, Bolton said, and they plan to start slowly with just a few clients. But she said a pilot program that used a car to pick up three passengers a day in South Burlington has been very successful.
By the end of next year, Bolton said she hopes their vans will be able to serve about 20 people in each county.
“It really felt like a win-win, because we could help people who are feeling more desperate in Rutland and Chittenden counties and we could increase our attendance," she said.
It's not possible to fill the need entirely, she admitted.
"But can we help a few people? Yes, we can certainly do that,” she said.
Anyone interested in the service can contact Elderly Services.
