Paladin Inc. held a ribbon-cutting ceremony on Tuesday, October 24 as an opportunity to refamiliarize Lake County with its Hobart branch. The event featured remarks by Paladin CEO Steve Hobby and Paladin Board President Paula Nichols. After the ribbon cutting, a facility tour was given.
“We did a ribbon cutting today because we wanted to reintroduce who Paladin was to the community,” said Hobby. “Over the years, we've had several different name changes, so we just wanted to outline what we've done.”
Located just two miles east of I-65, Paladin Inc.’s Hobart location provides important services for the community, especially for those in Lake County. For over 70 years the 2395 W Old Ridge Road location has served as support for people with disabilities and their families. Over the years the facility has had several name changes over the years, such as Bridges, the Arc, and Dungarvin, but the facility keeps the same great services despite the name change.
“It's wonderful because what we're doing is expanding our resources to other counties,” said Nichols. “We are all working together to provide more services to people with disabilities throughout the state of Indiana.”
The Hobart location has offered a variety of beneficial services for the people it serves over the years. An example of this is how Paladin helps children through their school careers to make sure the kids have the services they need to succeed throughout their entire lives.
Paladin also offers services to people of all ages. In addition to helping kids through their school years, it provides support for those who are older as well.
“When it comes time to find adult services as your parent's age, you can come to one of our agencies for help,” said Nichols.
Paladin is a member of the Crossroads Chamber of Commerce, which sponsored this event. Several members of the Crossroads Chamber were in attendance at Tuesday's event including President and CEO Deann Patena. Patena has been a long-time supporter of Paladin and its services because of how much it positively contributes to the Hobart and Lake County communities.
“Everybody deserves to have a place to go and spend their day, so it's important that Paladin is here to support our community with those needs,” said Patena. “We are here today to support them and provide them with any services that the chamber can help them with.”
As part of the festivities, attendees got to explore the facility and discover the new augmented sandbox. It is a sensory sandbox included in the sensory room of the facility.
“It’s really cool. It has been a dream of Tammy Gonzales’, who is the director of the program to get it,” said Hobby. “We also wanted to extend a thank you to Strack & Van Til for their generous donation. With that money, we were able to purchase it.”
Paladin is actually looking to take inspiration from this sensory room and bring it to other locations.
“Now that we’ve seen the sensory room here, we know what it does and its capability,” said Hobby. “In Michigan City, we're going to be doing a big remodeling job, and we're going to put in a sensory room. We're actually going to model it after what Tammy created here.”
All of what Paladin does would not be possible without the hard work of the staff. This is why Paladin keeps growing and helping the community.
“I can't thank them enough for all that they do on a day-to-day basis,” said Hobby.
For more information about Paladin, please visit https://paladin.care/.
