Grand Opening of Greenway

On Sunday, April 7, Still Hopes Retirement Community West Columbia, SC celebrated the Grand Opening of our new Greenway building. Though our Greenway residents have called Greenway home for over a month, Sunday was a time to open Greenway’s doors to the community at large for everyone to enjoy. Still Hopes’ very own Reverend Rich Crozier blessed the building before turning the microphone over to Danny Sanford, Still Hopes Executive Director. Danny gave a speech before the ceremonial ribbon cutting that beautifully explains Greenway’s history and what it now provides to our residents. After his speech, visitors were able to tour the Greenway building for themselves. Here is Danny’s full speech for those of you who were not able to join us:

“The Greenway building acquired its name to help honor the founder of our Community, Dr. Jane Bruce Guignard. More specifically, it is tribute to the Greenway walking trails that Dr. Jane Bruce’s family has helped to establish along our City’s river. On your tour of Greenway today, the new things you will find include the Riverbanks Apartments. Their name comes from the memory of where the clay that served to make the Guignard Bricks was dug. Also in this building, you will find three skilled nursing neighborhoods. Collectively they are the Dr. Jane Bruce Guignard Neighborhoods. Individually they are The Saluda, The Broad, and The Congaree. These names remind us of the significance that the convergence of our three rivers played in helping the SC Legislature of long ago to decide to relocate our state’s capital from Charleston to Columbia; significant to Still Hopes because in so doing, they brought the Guignard family, in the role of surveyor of the new capital city, and that culminated in the Guignard family making this wonderful place their permanent home.

Still more about this new space, is that it embodies the most advanced model of care for skilled nursing available anywhere, by allowing residents to live in a truly homelike setting. Inside each of the three neighborhoods you will find all the elements of a true home. You will find a front porch and entryway, a living room, a dining room and kitchen, and a sun room. You will then discover that the bedrooms, and a more intimate den setting, are located in the most private part of the neighborhood, just as you find true of your own homes. Beyond the wonderful architecture and beautiful interior design features, you will find a genuine sense of family, and of caring one for another to be alive and well; complete with staff that are being continuously trained to do the array of tasks associated with a small, intimate, home environment setting. In other words, you will find HOME and comfort.

The Riverbanks apartments, you will discover, offer a grand place to receive 24-hour assistance in living, within a luxurious apartment that is complete with its own kitchen, as well as living room and bedroom, but you will additionally find common living and playing spaces that allow these 22 people to form a family relationship and bond with one another, as well as with the staff who provide them supportive services to match their needs and desires.

Working to develop this part of our community has been a labor of love for our Board and for our staff, and we are so glad you have chosen to come and witness this dream brought to reality today. We hope you like it even half as much as we have all liked bringing it to fruition. The list of staff members who have worked tirelessly, and who continue to work hard, to make what you are here to see today a reality, are too numerous to mention by name today, but soon they will wear a badge of honor in the form of a Greenway logoed pin, so you will know who they all are. Let me assure you that they are ALL diligent, unsung heroes and champions of this noble cause and their fine efforts, without which this would not have ever been possible, shall long be remembered by the Still Hopes family. Thank you all ladies and gentlemen of Still Hopes, for your good good work and dedication to the mission that makes Still Hopes the grand endeavor that it is.

As the spokesman of these staff heroes today, I extend a hearty thank you to all of you, for your patience with us as we worked to make this dream a reality, and I welcome you to make this grand place a meaningful part of your own story and of your lives with us.”

We hope you have enjoyed this snapshot of our Greenway celebration. If you have not come to visit us at Still Hopes, please do. We would love to have you come enjoy this beautiful campus with us.