SkyLine applied for the Smart Rural Community (SRC) Collaboration Challenge through NTCA to secure a new close-captioned surveillance system for Ashe Assisted Living and Memory Care Center.

The assisted living facility was lacking high-quality access to video monitoring and did not have enough resources to purchase a complete system. The West Jefferson-based, not-for-profit residential care facility is owned and managed by Ashe Services for Aging (ASA), a non-profit agency that has been providing quality and compassionate care and services for the elderly and disabled adults of Ashe County since 1977. AAL services individuals 55 and older that need assistance with activities of daily living (bathing, dressing, toileting, ambulation and eating), medication management, meal preparation, daily activities program, transportation to doctors’ appointments and recreational events, as well as partnership with home health, hospice and behavioral health.

SkyLine’s CEO Jimmy Blevins first recognized how this center could benefit from the matching grant program while visiting his mother who resided there. The Challenge is an annual opportunity for rural broadband providers like SkyLine to obtain grants to deploy broadband-enabled solutions within their community and recruit the participation of other local leaders. Blevins shared the grant opportunity with Center Administrator Bevin South and the two organizations worked together to submit an application.

Those who worked on the SRC grant application and project included staff from ASA, AAL and SkyLine (left to right): Patricia Calloway, Karen Powell, Bill Clark, Bevin South and Jonathan Risk.

Having a state-of-the-art surveillance system through this collaborative initiative allows AAL staff to monitor the safety of its residents more effectively and capture on video unwitnessed falls, patterns of wandering and attempted elopements.

“I am so grateful to Jimmy and everyone else at SkyLine for turning our need into a reality,” said Bevin South, Administrator of Ashe Assisted Living and Memory Care. This system will help us ensure that we are providing the best services possible to our residents at ALL times, further enriching and celebrating their amazing lives.”

SkyBest’s Security’s surveillance/iP Network solution offers 3.0 Mega Pixel HD image bullet and dome cameras with some of the best night vision available and its onsite Network Video Recorder (NVR) comes with a mobile app to view live footage, making fiber-optic bandwidth a necessity.

“The installation of security cameras throughout our assisted living community has been a goal since our opening six years ago,” said Patricia Calloway, Ashe Services for Aging Executive Director. “Unfortunately, the drastic decline in Medicaid funding has left several projects unrealized. With the support of SkyLine, we are so grateful that we can now move forward with adding this amenity to our community.”