KANSAS CITY, Mo. — A local man who'd essentially been trapped in his home received a new beginning thanks to a community's generosity.
Arthur Buford's plight surfaced last month. He needed a new wheelchair ramp to be able to get out of his home.
Buford, 68, is wheelchair-bound and blind in his right eye. The wheelchair ramp in front of his house was too deteriorated to use, so he reached out to State Representative Brandon Ellington.
"It was warped and kind of threw me around," Buford said.
Within minutes, the organization The Whole Person responded.
"We got together, we came out, we looked at the situation and accessed it and determined that the existing ramp that he was using was not safe, not to code it needed to be torn down and rebuilt,” said Ron Bibbs, an American with Disabilities Act home modification coordinator for The Whole Person.
Representatives from The Whole Person along with volunteers from I Am My Brother’s Keeper and Hope Builders Home Repair came out to Buford’s house Saturday and constructed a new wheelchair ramp with help from a donation from the Home Depot.
As they worked, Buford could see his life changing forever.
“He's expressed to me, joy to sum it up in one word," Bibb said, "because up until this point he's been basically a prisoner in his own home."
