Christiansburg developer Roger Woody has made a gift of 27 acres off Farmview Drive between Warm Hearth Village and LewisGale Montgomery to the Sojourn Center to build a hospice house to serve terminally ill people.
Woody said the property was so beautiful that he thought it should be shared.
“Way back at the beginning when you were telling me about this, you said it’s about as close to heaven as you can get,” Sojourn board President Anne Judkins Campbell reminded Woody on a recent visit to the property.
Sojourn’s plans call for a seven-bedroom house surrounded by tranquil gardens and paths, that will serve as a home for people at the end of their lives. Hospice services in New River are delivered mostly in patients’ homes and their families become their round-the-clock caregivers with the support of hospice nurses, therapists and staff. Not all families are capable of doing this or do not want a death to occur in their home. Hospice houses provide a place where nurses and staff care for the residents and families can be families, Campbell said.
Sojourn Center has been preparing for eight years to build a hospice house. Woody’s gift will allow the board to begin to raise the funds to build and maintain the hospice house.
The land donation “will make a huge success in the progress of the project,” Campbell said. “Anytime we talk about building, the first two questions are where will it be and what will it look like.”