Lantern Park receives award from Goodwill

     For more than 30 years, Lantern Park Specialty Care has partnered with Goodwill of the Heartland to assist in creating job opportunities for people with barriers to independence. For 26 of those years, Lois Hahn, supervisor of laundry and housekeeping at Lantern Park, has provided those opportunities and supervised dozens of adult workers of all ages as they developed their skill set. On February 5, Goodwill of the Heartland delivered much deserved recognition by bestowing two awards – one to Lantern Park as Goodwill Employer Appreciation Award and the second, to honor Hahn for her time and dedication. 
     “Lois is able to come up with tasks the workers are able to do that might not otherwise get done,” says Administrator Kari Gerst. “We’ll have workers come in with their job coach a couple times a week for an hour or so to wipe down handrails or dust shelves.”
     “It’s just great. She’s so patient,” Gerst says.
     “This is the first time we’ve given two awards to the same business,” says Goodwill Job Placement Specialist Mark Jensen. “We like to honor our business partners with the Employer Appreciation Award, but it was also really important to us to honor Lois as well because she has been so supportive.”
     “Lois really believes in our mission to help folks overcome their barriers by finding work opportunities either finding jobs to be done or job shadowing and following up with worksite assessments,” Jensen says. “It gives our jobseekers real self-worth to be able to practice a skill set in an actual community work environment and feel like they are contributing to their community.”
     Jensen adds, “It’s been great to see some of the relationships developed between our on-site workers and the residents at Lantern Park…even the families and visitors will come up and thank them for a job well done.

     For more information, contact Lantern Park Specialty Care at 319.351.8440.