What seems like a simple, elegant solution – requiring medication aides to wear badges – is for the Innisfree community a bizarre intrusion. Our population is not the frail elderly who may see three different shifts of caregivers who may not be around for the long term. Our caregivers live and work with our residents (whom we call co-workers to emphasize that they are not clients or patients) and get to know them very well.

          The living conditions in individual houses are like people’s homes. Would a mother or father wear a badge? Most of our caregivers are volunteers who choose to live and work in a life sharing community. In the thirty-five years that I have been associated with Innisfree, as president and as a parent, it has been the sense of community among everyone who resides here that has above all sustained Innisfree’s uniqueness.

          To you, a badge may seem like a minor matter in the face of compelling problems of large-scale institutions. To us, it is symptomatic of the Procrustean problem -  stretching or shortening every way of life to fit one model of an assisted living facility. We don’t claim to be the only or the right model. We ask that you give us and other groups the breathing space to enrich the community of assisted living facilities and the lives of the people we serve.

                                                          Barbara J. Fried