What is HAPPI?

The Home Assistance Partners Program of Ionia [HAPPI] is a community based volunteer program designed to help elderly, low to moderate income senior citizens remain in their home and community. Who are volunteers? Volunteers are people, just like you, who care about their community and work to help others, in this case senior citizens, for free.

A number of elderly can remain in their own homes throughout their lives with just a little help from their neighbors. "What kind of help?" you ask. Some folks need help with chores outside their home such as yard work, window washing, minor repairs. Inside the home help with chores like laundry, dish washing and cleaning can help a person live longer at home. Few of these chores are daily requirements. Some of them are weekly or bi-weekly, some periodically, some seasonally or annually. They are chores the elderly managed to do when they were younger, but now they need your helping hands.

Who Benefits?

HAPPI benefits everyone involved from the elderly neighbor to the HAPPI volunteer. Besides helping with chores around the senior’s home, volunteers have the opportunity to interact with one another as well as the senior.

Additionally there are other benefits:

• medicaid costs to place a senior in a nursing home run in excess of $74,000 per year. Helping folks remain at home is a big tax break for everyone.
• as the baby boomers enter their senior years, the aging population will increase dramatically. Keeping these seniors at home benefits our local economy and our civic base of knowledge.
• intergenerational living, where seniors remain in their own neighborhood among young families, has proven to be an effective socializing contributor to our children and young adults.

What Can You Do?

One of your most precious commodities is your time. We are asking you to contribute some of it to better your own community.

Please complete an application for the HAPPI program and return it to the Ionia Commission on Aging.

If you are unable to contribute your time by volunteering, you can make a donation toward materials needed for the program. You can befriend an elderly neighbor. Just a phone call or better yet a short visit will give you some insight on what kind of help, if any, your neighbor might need.

For an application or more information, please contact: