Moving in Faith with Hope United's Groundbreaking Ceremony
September 28, 2014…our family received the worst news we could possibly imagine. Our son, Tyler Bornstein, was found dead and alone in an empty field….left there to die of an overdose. A couple weeks prior to this, Tyler relapsed after several months in recovery. With no insurance left, no money left for treatment, and no detox beds in Summit County, Tyler was put on a 3-week waiting list for help. Sadly, those 3 weeks never came for him.
Fast forward to September 28, 2018….after educating ourselves about addiction over the past 4 years, speaking out on the subject in our communities, and starting the non-profit organization called Hope United to help individuals and families understand and maneuver through the trials of addiction, we use this day as a way to offer HOPE back to our community. Hope United held a Groundbreaking Ceremony on Friday, September 28, 2018 to begin the first steps of building Ohio’s FIRST Relapse Prevention Wellness Center called “Tyler’s Redemption Place”. After much research, we learned that recovery isn’t done after treatment. The typical 30, 60, 90 days are just not enough to heal someone’s brain off of opioids and other drugs. Tyler’s Redemption Place will pick up where current treatment providers leave off, offering long-term support with an emphasis on the whole person: mind, body and spirit. It will be a center like no other, offering relapse prevention programs, peer to peer coaching, counseling, and family support groups to work on the mind, health and wellness facilities to work on the physical health and to offer holistic alternatives to pain, a café, library, amphitheater, and sober events to build a foundation of support and community, and worship services every week for those who want to work on their spiritual side.
We were so honored to have so many wonderful people come out on September 28th to show their support of the vision of Tyler’s Redemption Place. It was a pleasure to announce that we have chosen Welty Building Company to oversee the construction of Tyler’s Redemption Place. The employees of Welty that we have worked with over the past several months, have been nothing short of amazing. We were so grateful to have our close friend, Mayor Rick Justice of Lakemore, be our first speaker. He has worked so hard on our behalf to help make this project a reality. Our longtime friend and classmate, Lieutenant Governor Mary Taylor, gave a heartfelt speech that left many in tears. And we were privileged to have Summit County Executive Ilene Shapiro there to speak. Because of Ilene Shapiro and the Summit County Council’s decision to donate the land located on Sanitarium Road in Lakemore, Ohio, we are able to focus solely on the fundraising efforts for the facility alone. We were also grateful to have State Representative Robert Sprague make the trip from Toledo and honored to have him speak. We worked closely with him a few years ago to share our testimony that helped to pass Ohio’s Good Samaritan 9-1-1 law. And although we more recently met State Representative Tavia Galonski, we can feel her commitment to fight this addiction crisis and appreciate her support. In addition to the representatives of both Senator Rob Portman’s office and Senator Sherrod Brown’s office sharing heartfelt letters from the senators, we were honored to have many judges, first responders, councilmen and councilwomen from Lakemore and other surrounding communities, local pastors, friends, and family in attendance. Our Capital Campaign Chair, Bob Cooper, who was also in attendance, willingly posed for a photo showing why he believes in the vision of Tyler’s Redemption Place – in honor of his daughter Kathryn’s memory.
And we can’t forget to mention the wonderful companies that made donations to help make the event possible. Thank you so much to Coca Cola, First Student, Karla’s Sweetopia, Kern’s, Starbucks, Sully’s, and Welty. And we would be remiss if we forgot to thank the Teamsters, because without their donations of over $1.375 million dollars at the International Teamsters Convention in 2016, we would not have been able to expand our vision for recovery that we know will help thousands of individuals and families in Ohio. If you want to see the speech that led to their unbelievable generosity, you can view it here - https://youtu.be/dnNruLJ7ClA. To read more about the event, check out the articles in the Akron Beacon Journal - https://bit.ly/2Iqn3zM, and the Canton Repository - https://bit.ly/2OmW8KQ. And the Suburbanite did an exceptional job of covering the event. You can read their write up about the groundbreaking here. To view the many great photos captured that day, please check out the gallery of photos from the groundbreaking ceremony.
Hope United is on a journey to bring HOPE TO OHIO, and we invite you to join us. Although we have raised almost 25% of the funds to build our wellness center, we have a ways to go to fully fund it. We decided to move in faith, to do something special on September 28th, a day that brings much sadness to our family. We have no doubt that God has brought us this far for a reason, and we have no doubts that he will put the people and organizations that will help us move mountains in our path. We are determined to STAND UNITED to fight the drug, alcohol and suicide epidemics impacting our communities. We need you to join the movement, as we believe this is a game changer for the Tri-County area.
