Excerpted from “Goodness Gracious! Service Provider for Developmentally Disabled Adults Opens in Fanwood” originally published April 30 in TapintoScotch Plains/Fanwood. Read the full article there.
Gracious Services Inc., a healthcare provider for adults with intellectual and development disabilities officially opened at its new building at 25 South Ave. (former CKO Kickboxing) in Fanwood on Friday, April 28.
Gracious Services Inc. clients smile and wave at the grand opening.
Gracious Services has created an efficient system that helps improve overall quality of life and achieve optimal well-being for those individuals. Their system offers a variety of services including behavioral support, community inclusion, pre-vocational training and career planning, and more.
Gracious Services began in 2015 in Westfield, before COVID temporarily closed the facility. Co-founder Bayo Badmus, an immigrant who built a career on Wall Street as a stockbroker, knew that the business had to expand in order to care and provide the needed services to individuals with developmental disabilities.
Badmus says the organization customizes care to the interests of individual. His wife and co-founder, Grace, worked for many years with the state of New Jersey’s Division of Developmental Disabilities, where she was the case manager for Essex County.
“Every day she would come home complaining about how the needs of individuals are not being adequately met. Sometimes she came home crying, knowing that government services do not meet the needs of everybody,” he said.
“We decided we should set up a program with knowledge and caring, a loving attitude, and willingness and preparedness to care for people that really are helpless. Then that was how we developed this.”
Gracious Services’ ultimate goal is to ensure the comfort, convenience, and development of the individuals they serve and promote their independence. Their team values equality and diversity when delivering services, making sure that everyone gets the treatment and support that they need to transition properly through life.
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- Councilwoman Kathy Mitchell gets a hug from habilitation program member, Margaret.
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- Gracious Services Inc. client, Eric, performs at the grand opening.
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- Gracious Service Inc. CEO Matt Holmes applauds Eric during the grand opening.
CEO Matt Holmes give a tour of the facility to Councilwoman Kathy Mitchell and members of the Chamber of Commerce.
Matthew Holmes, the executive director of the Fanwood location, has three decades of experience in the business. A former member of the Atlanta Falcons, who proudly wears a Super Bowl ring. Holmes exudes positivity, singing with and high-fiveing clients and making them feel special. Members of the Badmus family are involved also, including Lanre, 26, a graduate of the Rutgers Graduate School of Business, Kunle, 20, a junior at Loyola University-Maryland, and Busola, a pre-med student at NYU.
Bayo Badmus believes that if somebody has disability, it should not preclude him or her from socializing with the larger community that should not deprive him or her of human rights and dignity.
“When you help one person, you help the whole world; that is how I feel about the services that we’re providing,” he said. “I look at it as service to do whatever I can do, as a human being, to uplift the living condition of individuals with disabilities. Human dignity is the core of what we do here.”
