The staff at Tri-Lakes Center for Independent Living, from left to right: Bill Miller, Tena Euber, Jordan McLean, Brett Kilroy, Susan Forrette and Mary Lamica. (Enterprise photo — Amy Scattergood)

SARANAC LAKE — In a back room of Tri-Lakes Center for Independent Living on Broadway in downtown Saranac Lake, what was once a conference room is now a PPE station. Paper bags loaded with masks, gloves and bottles of hand sanitizer fill a table like kids’ lunches at a crowded school. Boxes of more supplies are stacked against a wall, all purchased with a $220,000 grant from the Department of Health and Human Services, which since April has given $995 million in grants to help older adults and folks with disabilities cope with COVID-19 as part of the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security Act, known as the CARES Act.

“It was unexpected,” said Bill Miller, Executive Director of the TLCL, of the large grant. “We’d closed the Center down right around the Ides of March,” Miller said, with not a little irony.

TLCL has been serving Franklin and Essex counties for over 15 years, offering services for people with physical, psychological and developmental disabilities of all ages, as well as their families, friends, co-workers and employers. It’s a nonprofit, grassroots, civil rights organization, part of a network of centers that opened after the end of the Vietnam war and then grew in the wake of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, now celebrating its 30th anniversary.

“It was important to keep people safe,” said Miller, who figures they’ve handed out over 7,000 masks to 300 people so far, along with gloves and hand sanitizer.

Among the myriad issues TLCL has faced during the pandemic has been getting supplies and providing transportation, helping people be safe in their homes and when caregivers come to provide services, and dealing with the isolation that was a problem even before the stay-at-home orders.

“You’re kind of isolated already,” said Miller of so many of the folks he works with and for.

TLCL has also been purchasing laptops, tablets and hotspots for people without internet access, along with more of the ramps and wheelchairs and other helpful items that it loans out to whomever needs them.

Another much-need service the center provides? Information.

“We deal with a population that’s susceptible to folklore,” said Miller. This is not to say that folks with disabilities are necessarily more susceptible than the rest of the population, but that we all are. So TLCL works to get reliable information to those it serves to help correct what Miller calls “orally transmitted nonsense.”

The disabilities that the staff at TLCL deals with are more than physical. The center advocates for those with cognitive disabilities, addictions, learning disabilities, depression and anxiety.

“If you didn’t have anxiety before, this created it,” said Mary Lamica, the center’s Program Manager, of the pandemic.

“It was driving us all crazy,” Miller agreed. “I felt like Jack Nicholson in ‘The Shining,’ pacing around talking to myself.”

The anxiety and isolation of the last few months have increased the need for the advocacy that TLCL and the 38 other Independent Living Centers in New York State provide.

“We’re seeing a lot of people who are scared to ask for help,” said Miller.

Even without a global pandemic, said Lamica, debilitating anxiety can be triggered by something “just as simple as going through your mail.”

TLCL’s services also include independent living skills training, accessibility consultations, referral services, peer mentoring, and assistance with other agencies and groups such as Social Security, school districts, landlords, employers, Medicaid, HUD and food stamps.

There are approximately 5,000 residents of Franklin County and 4,000 in Essex County with disabilities. Almost 50 million people in the country have disabilities of some sort, including about 13% of the population of New York.

“Every place has its own definition of disability,” said Miller. “We just want to see people being responsible and safe.”

If you or someone you know would like assistance or PPEs from Tri-Lakes Center for Independent Living, contact them at: 518-891-5295, www.tlcil.org, info@tlcil.org, 43 Broadway, Suite 1, Saranac Lake.