St. Luke's Lifeworks

Inspirica, Inc. one of the largest providers of services to the homeless in Connecticut and the largest in lower Fairfield County.

Inspirica serves individuals and families that live in poverty or near poverty, and all are homeless or at risk of becoming homeless.

Each night Inspirica, Inc. houses approximately 300 people and each year serves more than 800 people.

They operate 11 facilities in lower Fairfield County and provide an extensive array of support services, including vocational training, workforce education, job placement, housing placement, job & housing retention support, children’s services, counseling, case management, and much more.

They are one of only a few organizations nationally that have combined residential services with extensive support services on a single, end-to-end, comprehensive platform. They further provide direct access to medical care, mental health care, psychiatric care, dental care, substance abuse treatment, etc. through a network of strategic partnerships.

Inspirica, Inc.'s Programs Include: Emergency Shelter- Transitional Housing- Permanent Supportive Housing- Deeply Affordable Housing- Rapid Rehousing- Children’s Services Early Childhood and Parenting Program -Employment and Housing Retention- Jumpstart Career- Jumpstart Employment- Jumpstart Vocational

History

1879

St. John’s Episcopal Church in Stamford begins an organized outreach program to immigrants living in South Stamford working for the Yale & Towne Manufacturing Company around 1879.

1972

St. Luke’s Community Center is established to serve the needs of children and families living in the neighborhood.

1986

The Community of St. Luke becomes St. Luke’s Community Services, a not-for-profit, non-sectarian organization.

1987

The Rev. Richard Schuster, the Assistant Director of Episcopal Social Services, becomes the Executive Director. The Gilead House Residential Program opens, providing four three-bedroom

apartment units for 13 persons with a history of psychiatric disabilities.

1988

The McKinney Residence Program opens, providing two three-bedroom apartment units serving 10 persons with AIDS.

1989

The Transitional Housing Program opens, providing six two-bedroom apartment units for 24 men and women in transition.

1990

The city of Stamford asks St. Luke’s Community Services to provide overnight shelter to women who are homeless. 21 women are accommodated.

1993

St. Luke’s Community Services opens the Center for Families and Children at Franklin Common, bringing 11 other agencies under one roof in order to provide a seamless service delivery system for families who have become homeless. St. Luke’s Community Services opens

• 58 single room occupancy units for up to 128 persons in need of short term and transitional housing.

• The Children’s Community, a childcare center for 100 children with infant through after-school programming.

• 12 single room occupancy units for 19 women who are single in need of short term and transitional housing.

1997

St. Luke’s Community Services changes its name to St. Luke’s LifeWorks. Through the Fairfield Community Development Corporation, 29 efficiency apartment units open at the Colony for persons with special needs and for low-income working persons.

1998

27 efficiency apartment units open at the Atlantic Park for persons with special needs and for low income working persons.

2009

The Rev. Richard Schuster retires after leading the agency for 22 years.

2010

Jason Shaplen is named Chief Executive Officer Mission Statement changes to: “Our mission is to break the cycle of homelessness by helping people achieve – and maintain – permanent housing and stability in their lives.”

2011

St. Luke’s LifeWorks achieves a record 151 job placements and 105 people moved from transitional to permanent housing. SLLW partners with Optimus and opens a health clinic at the Woodland campus. Children’s Services Program opens for all the children in shelter at Franklin Commons. The Youth Center offers educational and enrichment activities for this at-risk population.

2012

Significant improvements continue to be made to all the properties, with McKinney House being completely renovated. St. Luke’s LifeWorks officially changes its name to Inspirica, Inc. with the tagline, From Homelessness to Home, in March, 2012.

2014

Inspirica doubles the size of its family emergency shelter. The new Family Housing Emergency Shelter has 42 beds, expanding the size of the overall Family Housing Program by 25%. The total capacity of the Family Housing Program is now 105 beds, not including overflow space such as cribs. Inspirica renovates all four of its existing Family Housing suites to include a space for the case manager’s office to be housed within each suite.

2015

Inspirica breaks ground on 992 Summer Street- a collaboration with Charter Oak communities to bring a 48-unit deeply affordable housing facility for seniors to the heart of downtown Stamford.

2016

Inspirica launches its innovative Early Childhood and Parenting Program, a space dedicated to school readiness for children 0-5 and their parents. The center combines crucial early childhood learning/development and a pre-literacy program for the homeless children in our care with essential parenting skills classes for their parents.

Inspirica, Inc. - From Homeless to Home

On March 20, 2012, CEO Jason Shaplen officially changed the name of St. Luke's Lifeworks to "Inspirica."^[1]

CEO

Jason Shaplen is the CEO of Inspirica, one of largest providers of services to the homeless in the state of Connecticut. Prior to Inspirica, Mr. Shaplen was a senior executive at Project Renewal in New York City. In 2006, he founded IMRINTS, a social enterprise that doubles as a for-profit digital printing business and training program for homeless individuals. Before Project Renewal, Mr. Shaplen worked as a journalist at Newsweek and Dow Jones (Far Eastern Economic Review), a speechwriter on Bill Bradley’s presidential campaign, a management consultant at Booz Allen & Hamilton, and a senior executive at PCCW, a communications services firm in Hong Kong.

From 1995 to 1999, he served in an appointed diplomatic capacity as policy adviser at the Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organization (KEDO), where he negotiated international agreements with North Korea and participated in more than thirty rounds of international negotiations in North Korea (seven times), South Korea, Japan, and China. He also served as KEDO’s press spokesman and its liaison to the U.S. Congress. Mr. Shaplen lived in Asia for twenty years. He was a Thomas J. Watson Fellow in Malaysia and Israel and a Fulbright Scholar in the Philippines. His work has appeared in various publications, including Foreign Affairs, the New York Times, the New York Times Magazine, the Los Angeles Times, the International Herald Tribune, the Asian Wall Street Journal, the Boston Globe, Newsweek, and on foreignaffairs.org.

References

Coordinates: 41°03′36″N 73°32′32″W / 41.05991°N 73.54230°W / 41.05991; -73.54230