NW Works reopens under new city roof
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By Alex Bridges - abridges@nvdaily.com
WINCHESTER -- It took a few weeks for Daniel Colvin to learn his way around the new NW Works Inc. facility on Shawnee Drive in the city.
But he and the other dozens of disabled people like him remain thankful for a bigger place to learn job skills and earn a living.
"I like it," Colvin said Monday after a dedication and grand opening event. "It's been a long time coming."
Representatives of the nonprofit agency agreed as they celebrated the new site. Former Gov. Timothy M. Kaine and former state Sen. H. Russell Potts Jr., who played roles in raising the funds needed to renovate and relocate the facility, also attended the event. NW Works returned the favor by naming its production floor after Kaine and the gymnasium for Potts.
"This is a loaves-and-fishes story is what this place is," Kaine said.
"People -- and a lot of people -- had to put what they had into that basket."
The musical performances by the workers drew standing ovations from the audience of more than 100.
The agency made its home in buildings on East Cork Street and North Cameron Street before moving to the 28,000-square-foot facility on Smithfield Avenue in 1980, according to Susan Dawkins-Ireland, who co-founded Northwestern Workshop in 1970 with other concerned residents.
Trish Stiles, who appeared Monday on behalf of state Sen. Jill Holtzman Vogel, R-Upperville, worked for the agency during its early years.
"It's just absolutely the culmination of a dream," Stiles said.
Kaine credited NW Works' mission -- giving people with disabilities a chance to work for a living -- for its longevity.
Chief Executive Officer John C. Brauer explained that the project hit a snag when the agency had to change gears from new construction and take the Shawnee Drive facility. The project received a $1 million Community Development Block Grant. The federal stimulus dollars remained attached to the Frederick County site on Shady Elm Road, but the agency worked with the locality to use the money, albeit in a short time. An architectural firm drew up plans in late 2009, then performed some of the preliminary work to make the project shovel-ready.
But Colvin said he and other co-workers found themselves lost in their unfamiliar surroundings after moving from the site on Smithfield Avenue. At one point, he pushed himself in his wheelchair into a utility closet thinking it was the bathroom, Colvin recalled with a laugh.
"They're going 'Wrong door. Oh, wrong door,'" Colvin said.
Colvin's favorite part about the new center -- the short distance between the mailroom and the production floor.
For Colvin, a new building gives him a bigger place to "do a little bit of everything," from mailing and embossing napkins to other jobs on the production-room floor. He recalled waiting for moving day.
"I would come in from day to day to day and they'd tell me 'It's coming, it's coming, it's coming,' and now it's finally here and it's like, 'Oh my God,'" Colvin recalled. "It's reality."
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