Training, Education & Research Institute celebrates acquisition

By: JESSICA MUSICAR - For the North County Times | Saturday, October 23, 2004 10:41 PM PDT ∞

SAN MARCOS ---- Clients, friends and investors of the Training, Education & Research Institute viewed property that will become the organization's new home during its first fall festival and capital campaign update Saturday.

The institute is a nonprofit corporation that provides services for individuals with developmental and learning disabilities. It purchased the land about two years ago to build its Center for Research & Life Planning, where many of its educational, recreational and therapeutic programs will be held.

About 300 people attended the event that included speeches by county Supervisor Bill Horn and San Diego County Sheriff's Department spokesman Chris Saunders, who spoke for Sheriff Bill Kolender, tours of the 20-acre parcel at 555 Deer Springs Road, carnival games, face painting and food provided by Hunter Steakhouse.

The festival was an opportunity for the organization to share its plans for the future with the local community, its clients and its donors, said Bill Mara, the associate director of the institute.

The institute serves about 600 clients and families with its offices in Oceanside and 10 group homes throughout North County. It also offers classes for children age 5 to 22 who cannot be sufficiently cared for by the public school system, Mara said.

Set in a rural area of the city, the new site will provide a peaceful place to learn for the students as well as central location that can house all of the institute's programs, Mara said.

"This is something that we thought would be wonderful for (the clients)," Mara said.

The organization also plans to leave about 18 acres of open space for students and clients to wander in.

Construction will not begin until the organization obtains a multiple-use permit from the city and raises $23 million, said Cheryl Kilmer, the institute's executive director and founder. Kilmer said she hopes the center will be completed by 2009. To date, the organization has raised $2.5 million for the project.

The approximately 92,000-square-foot center will include a research department, which will use applied research to learn about autism, a learning academy, a vocational center, a multipurpose gymnasium and a therapeutic equestrian program that will allow clients and students to ride and work with horses, Mara said.

Dirce Schwarz, a parent of two sons with developmental disabilities, said the organization has helped her children a great deal during the 20 years they've been involved.

"They've given my sons a fantastic life, a life that every parent with a child born with any disability wishes they could have," Schwarz said, as she ate dinner with her sons David and Harvey Schwarz III.

Schwarz said that she was once told that her sons, both in their early 40s, would never be able to do anything, however with the institute's help, they both have jobs and live in a residential program.

"I think they are truly interested in training them toward the greatest potential they can achieve," Schwarz said of the organization.

She added that the new facility will make inroads on disabilities such as autism that many parents like herself have been waiting to see happen.

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