Archway Station, Inc.

The Articles read in part:

This Corporation is organized…for the purpose of providing services to a segment of the community which includes persons discharged from mental health facilities with severe mental illness…by shifting the focus of service from individual pathology to individual function…to encourage and develop the natural folk support system…and to operate a re-socialization center.

These purposes are largely still relevant four decades later.

FY '81 was Archway's first official year as an incorporated Agency. In August 1980, the Western Maryland Consortium awarded a major funding grant to Archway Station and six staff persons were hired. This Consortium grant was a tremendous boost to the Agency since funding from DHMH that year was minimal. Ms. Denise VanDermar was hired as Executive Director of the fledgling Agency.

Toward the end of FY '81, the Consortium money ran out and the staff of Archway Station was, for all intents and purposes, gutted. It was a very difficult time for everyone and the Agency survived only because of the hard work and dedication of a handful of people who believed in community-based support programs.

The Agency faced FY '82 with a suddenly depleted staff and a DHMH budget of $21,354 (this was later supplemented by a grant of $16,126). An Executive Director was hired and in an effort to bring new funds to the Agency, Project Home apartments were opened. Unfortunately, through lack of financial planning and sound management, the introduction of Project Home only further complicated the Agency's already troubled financial picture and the Executive Director resigned in the spring of 1982, with the position left vacant for several months and with the Agency operating in the red week after week. The second half of FY '82 was, perhaps, the most difficult time in the Agency history.

In response to the crisis that the Agency was going through, the Board of Directors reorganized and advertised for a new Executive Director. Mr. Lou Van Hollen was hired on July 1, 1982. The new Director and the Agency Board worked together to stabilize the Agency and put it back on good footing, both financially and operationally. At the end of that first fiscal year, the Project Home budget had stabilized and was in the black by $5,165; and the DHMH budget had increased. In addition to the stabilization of the operational budgets, Archway also purchased the former Wendt Funeral Home that year for $125,255. Suddenly the Agency’s growing pains seemed a thing of the past and FY '84 was approached with a new attitude.

FY '84 was another good year for the Agency and Archway moved its base of operations from St. John's Church to their newly acquired building in the spring of that year and a new feeling of permanency pervaded the Agency.

That’s our history but there’s a lot of story between those early years and the present. We’ve grown and learned a lot along the way but we’ve brought our morals, values, ethics, principals and mission with us each year.