Happy Hour Service Center

Happy Hour Service Center, which since 1956 has provided services to developmentally disabled adults, held a fall festival and Halloween mash-up for its individuals and staff.

“We try to have a dance or an activity once a quarter,” said Lori Chaney, Happy Hour Human Resources director. “This year we just combined it with Halloween so to dress up, have fun, games, food and a live DJ.”

Chaney said the people involved with Happy Hour greatly enjoy dancing, and some of the other activities the center has include a Valentine’s dance and a Christmas dance.

Chaney said the center has been having fall festivals for more than 20 years as a fun way to let individuals and staff enjoy themselves.

Adults at the center also get the opportunity to participate in the Special Olympics. Chaney said the adults just finished masters bowling, and they also get to go swimming twice a week throughout the summer.

Happy Hour serves developmentally disabled adults, and the goal is to teach them life skills, work ethics and social skills.

“We train them every day in work skills, social skills and life skills,” Chaney said. “We teach work ethics, and a lot of them clock in and out and work on contracts. They will work on projects, complete a task and that gets sent to the customer.”

Basic life skills include washing clothes, making beds, cooking and other ways in which a person must take care of him or herself. The ultimate goal, Chaney said, is to get the adults to graduate from the center in order to hold a job and live on their own within the community.

“Some won’t be able to,” Chaney said. “That is just the way it is with a center like this, so we work with them and they are there (at the center) on a daily basis.”

Happy Hour Service Center serves the developmentally disabled citizens of Houston County, and it is a nonprofit 501(c)(3)

organization.

It provides a variety of services to Robins Air Force Base as well as the business community. Because the exceptional citizens who are served by Happy Hour are trained in several work aspects, the center is capable of providing mass production for many different functions.

“For instance, we can do assembly, sorting, packaging, repairs, restoration, etc. In addition, we perform confidential and non-confidential shredding for several businesses and mortgage companies,” Chaney said.

Some individuals are unable to live on their own, and the center provides residential services for them. It currently has 35 individuals living in Falcon Park Inc., the group homes of the

center.

The center serves individuals who are 18-plus and have an IQ of 70 or below. Individuals can have mild, moderate, severe or even profound mental disabilities, and some many also have a mental illness, Chaney said.

There is a 10 to 1 ratio of adults to employees working with them, though for the more severely challenged individuals, the ratio is smaller.

“The higher functioning individuals can do a lot for themselves,” Chaney said. “We have adequate staff to care for the individuals.”

As the director of Human Resources, part of Chaney’s job is to find and hire staff members to care for the exceptional adults.

“For residential, we’re looking for CNA (Certified Nursing Assistant),” Chaney said. “Must have patience, a huge heart to work with this population, compassion. Experience is preferred, but there are only so many centers that do what we do, so we will train staff

members.”

For more information, visit the website at www.happyhourservicecenter.org and like it on Facebook.

HHJ News