Intergenerational Elder-Care Community Celebrates Recovery From Fire

CHESTNUT RIDGE, NY — A unique community dedicated to elder care in Rockland County recently celebrated the opening of a new residential building to replace one destroyed by fire May 31, 2020.

It is also called Pine Lodge — and the name is particularly apt, given that lodgepole pines are literally born from fire, as their cones require heat to open and release seeds, said Tari Steinrueck, the administrator of the Fellowship Community.

The non-profit intergenerational community serves the needs of elders through the phases of aging, "surrounding and supporting the individual with a more human approach to care."

"Founded in 1966, it was started actually by a group of people who were dedicated to doing good in the world," Steinrueck told Patch. "It was focused on the premise that every human being is a spiritual being on a path of development in this world, and how do we support that? In a short time that narrowed down to elder care. In the life span that we are given, how do we give elders their rightful place? How to help the older person, recognizing that they’re still a developing human being on a spiritual path?"

With a continuum of care from independent apartment living to an old-age home setting with medical care, the Fellowship Community achieves an environment where the members are integral in the running of the community, Steinrueck said.

"We have members who sit at the front desk, who do bookkeeping in our medical office, who help with laundry and gardening. They aren’t just window dressing," she said. "We count on them and that creates their experience that they’re needed — that it’s their community."

The community currently has about 85 seniors and 17 live-in co-workers, with 10 children, as well as many others who are non-resident members.

There's an 80-acre campus, which includes the independent apartments, nursing home, staff family housing, community kitchen and doctors' offices. It runs the last dairy farm in Rockland County and keeps chickens, and uses the milk and eggs for the dining room. Their farm is large enough to grow food for their kitchen and also run a CSA. The seniors are active on the farm as they are able.

This differs from some elder care facilities that offer small raised-bed garden boxes for residents.

"It’s not so you can play. You are needed," Steinrueck said. One of the biggest community efforts is in the spring, when 20-30 elders will work in the greenhouse transplanting seedlings.

They're a "neighbor" of the Threefold Community, which is located on 140 wooded acres surrounding the Fellowship Community.

The Threefold Community includes the Threefold Education Center, Green Meadow Waldorf School (400 students, grades K-12), the Pfeiffer Center (environmental education, biodynamic agriculture, and organic beekeeping), Eurythmy Spring Valley (movement art), Sunbridge Institute (Waldorf teacher education and adult anthroposophical studies), the Otto Specht School (Waldorf education for children with learning differences), the Fiber Craft Studio (healing senses and soul through work with plants and natural fibers), and the Hungry Hollow Co-op Natural Foods Market. It was inspired by the teachings of Rudolf Steiner.

In addition to being vital to the day to day running of the community, its elders are enriched by having younger people — adults and children — to teach, to assist, to enjoy.

"We put a lot of emphasis on the social relationships," Steinrueck said. "Elder care, care of the land, care for each other through our social relationships ... Depression is a huge thing for elder people. We have far less of that through creating a healthful environment for everybody to flourish."

To celebrate the new Pine Lodge, the Fellowship Community held a ribbon-cutting ceremony Sunday.

They hosted Chestnut Ridge Mayor Rosario Presti and Deputy Mayor Chaim Rose, as well as NY State Senator Bill Weber.

Fellowship Community Co-Founder Ann Scharff did the honors by cutting the ribbon. Recognition was given to building architect Michael Scharff; Sirois Construction and their partners; the Fundraising Committee of the Board of the Trustees, led by Katherine Scharff; Fellowship Administrator Tari Steinrueck; and all who contributed gifts ranging from $5 to $250,000 to make the new building possible.

The guests took a tour of the building after the ceremony, to see the new apartments in Pine Lodge as well as the state of the art geothermal system that will be used to heat and cool the building in an environmentally responsible way.

In fact, the fire has led to more flourishing.

"In a way it has added to the revitalization of the community, because there was this social impulse," Steinrueck said. "We had 157 donors to offset the difference between what the insurance paid and what we needed to put up a new building."

Plus, they've gotten new members, and articulated a desire for more remodeling.

"This is what we need to do, where we need to go to be vibrant and able to serve the next 57 years," she said. "We try to look toward gratitude, even though it can be painful. We’re practicing gratitude and it’s showing results."