Rick Clarkson knocked on the door after learning the woman residing inside had a plumbing issue. He had only been on the job as the Executive Director of the Corliss Institute for a matter of days, but with no one else immediately around to answer the call, he sought to address the issue right away.

But there was a problem, because the woman couldn’t hear him knocking at her door.

Like many of the people who rent condos from one of the Corliss Institute’s group homes in uptown Warren, she was deaf. But even after getting her attention utilizing the Telecommunications Relay Services, Clarkson learned while signing with the woman that she had also become mostly blind due to another condition she had developed. But Clarkson persisted.

“Our maintenance guy called a local plumber, and he got there in an hour,” he recalled. “Like, where else does that happen?”

It’s an anecdote that pretty perfectly encapsulates the value of the Corliss Institute, a nonprofit organization that for around 40 years has sought to provide a variety of services to developmentally disabled people who are also deaf.

It’s not a big staff — comprised of four and a half administrators, including Clarkson, and about two dozen direct service providers (DSPs) who are responsible for taking care of the around 20 members who rely on their services, about half of which require 24/7 care. But a recent tour through their facilities showed the noticeable impact that would be felt were they not around.

Bunmi Osho, the program manager for Corliss who preferred not to disclose how long she’s worked there (“A long time,” she said with a smile), knows that impact perhaps more than anyone.

“It’s for the love of it,” she said when asked what got her into the field in the first place. “Knowing that being there for them and what we do as DSPs, nurses, all of us together as a team, what we do is very big in their individual lives.

“They see us as their family. We are the ones they see every single day. If they need anything, we’re here. Their birthday parties, we’re here.”

Corliss dedicates its resources and staff to caring for individuals who span a range of abilities and afflictions. Some require around the clock care, while others live independently but come regularly to participate in day-time activities. They maintain three group homes, which are rented out primarily to those who are differently abled but can also be rented outside that community.

The staff is also a mix of deaf and non-deaf people, some of which Clarkson actually knew as children when they attended and he worked at the Rhode Island School for the Deaf — a career he enjoyed for 29 years.

After a stint as Head of School for the West Bay Christian Academy and a couple of adjunct professor gigs at Salve Regina and Johnson & Wales University, Clarkson got a call from a colleague and friend about the opening at Corliss.

“I’ve been retired twice,” he joked. But the work happening at Corliss energized him to take on the role.

A changing initiative
For much of its history, the Corliss Institute had focused on providing activities at their center — essentially keeping their members within their own isolated community. Those activities are delightfully wholesome to witness, too, with smiling members making bracelets together, drawing, reading, and performing other various arts and crafts projects during a recent visit.

But changes at the state and federal levels, which kicked in pretty much at the same time Clarkson was beginning at Corliss on July 1 of this year, have shifted the goals for assistance organizations to become more focused on getting the differently abled out into their local community more.

Clarkson said the new regulations and reimbursement formula caused some concern among staff at first, but he’s enthusiastic about providing new opportunities for their members, and the potential to hire more staff from the increased funding that will become available through such excursions.

“You can do things like swimming at the Y. Take a quilting class at the senior center. Take a hike down the bike path. Yoga lessons. Anything that’s community-based. Just getting out there,” he said. “At first we were like, ‘Oh my gosh, we have to change everything.’ Well, the spin I’m putting on it is, right, we’re going to change things, and we hope it’s going to impact the lives of the people we serve much more positively, and we’re going to get more money to do that so we can get more staff and provide more opportunities.”

Clarkson said they are looking to hire as many as five more DSPs to assist the members who are capable of community excursions, or provide additional services to those who are more limited.

Clarkson, a native of Iowa who married a native Bristolian and has lived in Bristol for the past 15 years, said that he has already been encouraged by the reception from the Warren community (in addition to the quick response time of local plumbers), and hopes for that to continue as the members become more visible outside the center in the coming months and years.

“It’s a unique and special community, but we want the community to continue to be receptive to our folks, and to people who look and sound differently. Rather than giving them a stare, give them a ‘Hi, hello, how are you,’” he said. “If we could collaborate to find more community-based opportunities for our members to participate in, we’d be happy.”

For Osho, who jumped into the world of assistive care for the deaf without even knowing sign language at first, the change towards more community outreach is one that coincides with her hopes for a more accepting society in general.

“I think the benefit to them is they will get to be around other people, and the chance to see that we’re all the same. It’s just that we don’t speak like they speak. We have our language, and they have their language, but we can all commingle and do things together,” she said. “We are all human beings, and we’re created equally.”

If you are interested in working for Corliss or learning more about their services, visit www.corliss.org.