$175,000 Grant Aids Kids' Therapy
1/26/2004
A federal grant will allow Leg Up Farm to continue working on the design of its 77,000 square-foot treatment center.
“Now, we’re going to finally start to see pieces coming together,” said founder Lou Castriota, Jr. 33, of New Freedom.
U.S. Sens. Arlen Specter and Rick Santorum announced Thursday that the comprehensive therapy center for children will receive $175,000.
Castriota was surprised and enthusiastic about the news.
“That money will be used immediately for building development, so it’ll go toward the architecture, civil engineering, electrical engineering, for the design of the building,” he said.
The facility will offer traditional therapies like occupational and physical therapy, as well as less traditional programs such as horseback riding.
It will be built on land in East Manchester Township owned by Barbara Warren.
The land development plan will be presented tomorrow to the township’s planning commission, which may recommend its approval to the board of supervisors.
Castriota said he is waiting for Gov. Ed Rendell to release $4.56 million in capital redevelopment assistance funds. Through fundraising efforts, Leg Up Farm will match that amount for a total of $9 million to build the facility.
Castriota has the support of several Pennsylvania politicians, who have written letters to Rendell, urging him to release the money.
In a Jan. 12 letter to Rendell, state Rep. Daylin Leach, D-Montgomery County, said, “Leg Up Farm will provide a necessary service for the most vulnerable of our citizens as well as provide economic development for a rural community.”
Leg Up Farm was incorporated as a non-profit in the fall of 1997, just months after his daughter Brooke, now 7, was diagnosed with mitochondrial disease.
By TED CZECH, The York Dispatch/Sunday News