Bethany Children's Health Center celebrated the opening of its first home in a new initiative that aims to address the need for affordable and accessible housing for individuals with disabilities during a ribbon-cutting ceremony Tuesday.
Dewayne Pollard, 21, is serving as the pilot resident for the Mattie Homes Project. He's a former patient at Bethany who was in a car accident in 2019 in his hometown of Altus. He broke his neck, and now he has C4 to C6 tetraplegia.
The house he's moving into is called the Dewayne Model: a two-bedroom, two-bath home with full wheelchair accessibility just south of the hospital. It boasts features ranging from an open floor plan with a full turning radius to advanced smart technology, like an oven he can control with his phone and an induction cooktop that only heats when a pan touches it.
Pollard said he particularly loves his new kitchen sink, which can turn on with just a touch of his hand.
"With my other house, I have to turn the knobs, and usually, I just push it, and that takes me a minute," Pollard said.
Bethany Children's Health Center CEO Nico Gomez said the Mattie Homes Project – named after Mattie Mallory, its founder – was built on the idea that many patients were aging out of the hospital and struggling to find housing. Less than 5% of housing nationwide is accessible for people with moderate mobility difficulties, and less than 1% is accessible for those who use wheelchairs.
Fewer are both accessible and affordable.
"While it's a little bit out of our hospital mindset, it was important for us to play a part, if we could," Gomez said. "Let's start having a conversation about accessible and affordable housing."
The project came to life in partnership with Iron Bison Homes, a real estate developer in Norman. Pollard also served as a consultant on the project.
Iron Bison Homes CEO and owner Preston O'Brien said they spent a day with Pollard in his hometown. O'Brien said he saw opportunities for change from the moment Pollard greeted them in his driveway.
"The thresholds on his door that were an inch, inch and a half tall – sometimes he said, when the battery-powered strength of his chair isn't strong enough, he can't get over the door threshold," O'Brien said. "So we have zero thresholds in this house."
"Every detail, every aspect of this home was designed around Dewayne and helping him live a safer and better quality of life," he added.
Gomez said the plan is to lease the property – and, eventually, others like it – at an affordable price point.
"The idea is a person is going to rent a home like they would in [a] community," Gomez said. "They're gonna put their own financial resources into it because we want them to have that ownership feel."
The goal is to leverage momentum to raise funds and keep the model going, Gomez said. The hospital owns several lots in this community where it wants to build more houses. Gomez said Bethany will learn from Pollard's experience and see what they can do to make the initiative better and more affordable.
And, the hope is others will join in.
"Our desire and our dream is to build multiple homes here in Bethany, but also provide a blueprint for other communities – really other home builders to start to include accessible, affordable housing within their developments to make it available to more people," Gomez said.
Until then, Pollard said he looks forward to sharing his life in his new home. He said he couldn't believe how customized the house was, calling this experience "once-in-a-lifetime."
He wants other individuals with disabilities to see what can be possible.
"I just want to push people to be the best versions of themselves," Pollard said. "Because I felt like once you are the best version of yourself, there's nothing that can stop you – you can have a future, if you want it."
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