Kelli Higgins wants to pursue a career in modeling.

The 31-year-old Spokane Valley resident loves having her picture taken, has a defined sense of style, likes to hit the mall to shop for clothes, and enjoys the popular TV show "America's Next Top Model."

Yet, Higgins, who has cerebral palsy, will have to rely on help from The Arc of Spokane, a nonprofit that serves people with developmental disabilities and their families, to find work as a model.

A host of programs

The Arc of Spokane, which is one of 750 chapters of The Arc nationwide, offers a host of programs, ranging from group living to job placement to education and support for the disabled and their families.

Among them, it helps parents manage the mix of emotions they feel after learning that their child has a developmental disability such as Down syndrome or autism. Other programs include one that helps developmentally disabled adults find meaningful work, one that helps them manage their finances, and another that provides them with social and recreational opportunities, says Brian Holloway, development and communications director for The Arc of Spokane.

"It's very hard to encapsulate the vast array of challenges that our constituents face at different times in their lives, let alone to explain how we address them the way we do," he says. "Like any nonprofit, The Arc provides lots of different programs that do important things for our constituents, but the one thread that seems to link them all together is the conviction that everyone, including those who may seem very different, has something valuable to offer."

He adds, "People with developmental disabilities have the same desire to experience a rich and rewarding life that everyone does, and The Arc's mission is to provide opportunities for our constituents to do exactly that."

Stephanie Boyle, a community living instructor for The Arc of Spokane and Higgins' guardian, says that although Higgins can't speak, she has made it perfectly clear what she wants to do.

In addition to Higgins' love of fashion, she also happens to be quite photogenic, says Boyle, so the idea of her trying to become a model "was one of those things that it just made sense to try it."

So far, Higgins has been asked to have some pictures taken for Spokane Transit Authority and she has appeared in Logan Magazine, a Spokane nonprofit publication that seeks to inspire and inform young women with disabilities.

"This is really outside-the-box thinking," says Holloway.

The Arc of Spokane employs 181 people, full and part time, and has a $5.5 million annual budget, says Greg Falk, its executive director. The nonprofit was started here in 1950 as The Spokane Council for the Retarded Child, and after a series of name changes, became The Arc of Spokane in 1991.

Falk says The Arc here serves Spokane County, where an estimated 6,600 people with developmental disabilities live.

The nonprofit receives about $2.75 million in funding from a unit of the Washington state Department of Social and Health Services for a residential program in which it operates seven group homes here for people with developmental disabilities. Those homes currently serve 42 adults, Falk says.

It gets another about $1 million from the agency, through Spokane County, for its employment program, in which it places people with developmental disabilities in jobs in supervised settings.

The Arc also generates about $900,000 a year through its used clothing and household goods solicitation program, through which it picks up such items and sells them to the Bellevue, Wash.-based thrift-store chain owner Savers Inc., which does business here as Value Village.

In the nonprofit's program that helps people manage their finances, recipients who are on Social Security, about 400 currently, pay a fee of about $38 per month for the help, while recipients on welfare, currently about 100, are served free and the cost is reimbursed to The Arc by the state DSHS, Falk says.

"Money can be a foreign concept for them," he says. "They lack the abstract reasoning necessary to handle the responsibility."

The Arc runs a community center at 116 W. Indiana, for socializing, recreational and educational activities, and exercise. Activities there include classes, crafts, gym sports, games, discussion groups, monthly dances, and an annual talent show.

"Loneliness is the No. 1 challenge facing our constituents," Falk says.

Those who use the community center pay $10 for a nearly four-hour session, and those fees cover roughly half the cost of running the facility, he says. Most of the rest of the cost comes from sales of the used clothing and household goods, and about 5 percent comes from the United Way of Spokane County.

Another Arc program helps people with developmental disabilities buy a home. The program, which has helped 53 people in the last five years, assists participants in creating an action plan for buying a home, which breaks down the tasks into manageable pieces that can be implemented in months or years. It also helps them find a house, make an offer, secure a mortgage, and get the sale closed, after which it assists the buyer with long-term financial management and maintenance of the home, he says.

The Arc of Spokane just bought a new home of its own.

Earlier this month, the nonprofit closed on the purchase of Inland Power & Light Co.'s former headquarters building east of downtown, and it plans to consolidate its operations there next summer, Falk says. The electric cooperative recently moved into new facilities at 10110 W. Hallett Road, on the West Plains.

The Arc paid $1.4 million for the 22,000-square-foot building and underlying property, at 320 E. Second, and expects to spend about $1 million remodeling the facility, Falk says. Integrus Architecture PS, of Spokane, is designing the remodel of the building, he says.

The nonprofit plans to sell its two North Side buildings, Falk says. It plans to sell its 5,000-square-foot main office building at 127 W. Boone, which it owns outright and has listed for sale at $550,000. It also plans to vacate the roughly 10,000 square feet of floor space it occupies in the 18,000-square-foot building at 116 W. Indiana, which it also owns outright, Falk says. The Nurturey Child Care Center LLC, which has been a tenant in the Indiana building for 10 years, is in the process of buying the building. He says The Arc hopes to get $1.2 million from those sales.

He says the move to the building on Second Avenue and consolidation there will improve the nonprofit's operational efficiency and reduce expenses, potentially saving it about $50,000 a year, and also will reduce confusion for clients and boost visibility.

A large part of the remodel will be creating a community center in the lower level of the new facility, equipped with a kitchen and special restrooms. An elevator also will need to be installed, along with new roofing, carpeting, paint, signage, and mechanical systems, he says.

The organization is in the middle of a capital campaign to raise about $1 million, and has applied for $1 million in federal appropriations, Falk says, adding "It looks like we're going to get a sizable one."

Separately, The Arc of Spokane and The Arc of King County jointly were awarded a federal grant worth $1 million, which they will share over the next five years and will use to create resource centers for families caring for both children and adults with developmental disabilities.

The centers will help families in the areas of health care, housing, parenting skills, child care, employment, education, recreation, transportation, respite care, financial assistance, and personal assistance. Some of that funding is intended to help non-English speaking families who sometimes don't know where or how to access such services, as well as families living in rural areas, where services are often scarce, Holloway says.

Falk says one of the major challenges facing The Arc is finding a way to smooth the transition for people leaving high school—where programs, education, social activities, and a daily routine exist—and getting on with the rest of their lives, during which such support isn't always available.

"The quality of life can really plummet" after high school for people with developmental disabilities, he says. "We want the transition to be better for them."

The Arc wants to make sure people such as Higgins have work, transportation, and anything else they need to achieve a full life, Falk says.

Holloway says Higgins' goal of becoming a professional model is a good example of that goal.

"Many might look at Kelli's disability and call her goal impossible, but by focusing on what she can do instead of what she can't, we see Kelli in a whole different light," Holloway says. "She may not be able to speak, but she has a great eye for fashion and, more importantly, she is passionate about it."