In a small gym on Nonotuck Street in Florence, Jonathan Stiles stands before Anna Kolodziej coaxing her to step forward and hit the palm of his hand with her fist. Clutching an elastic exercise band, which is attached to a weight machine, she smiles broadly as she yanks that fist toward him.
The pair repeats the routine about a half dozen times.
When she is done, Stiles buckles Kolodziej’s feet onto the pedals of a stationary bike and switches the TV overhead to the Disney Channel as she begins pedaling.
The room is small with a few treadmills, stationary bikes and weights. Kolodziej, 33, comes here up to four times a week to work out, breaking a sweat with the weight machine, walking on the elliptical or pumping the stationary bike.
Though it looks like a typical gym, tucked away in an old mill building, Fit Together is primarily for people who have mental illness or developmental disabilities.
After her day program at Riverside Industries in Easthampton, where she helps deliver Meals on Wheels, Kolodziej of West Chesterfield is dropped by a van at Fit Together, where staff from ServiceNet, a behavioral health agency, guide her from machine to machine, ensuring that her workout is both comfortable and safe.
She is among just over 130 gym members, many of whom are clients of ServiceNet, who use the facility for a nominal fee, or even free. But for a portion of them, that access may in be jeopardy. Funding cuts at ServiceNet mean a reduction in staffed hours at the gym is looming.
To help make up for the loss of about $200,000 it expected to get from the state Department of Mental Health, ServiceNet plans to reduce staffed hours from 60 to just nine per week, a change that Anna’s mother, Sally Kolodziej says will shut some people out.
Without guidance, she said, her daughter would not be able to work out here. Staff, she says, motivate Anna, show her how to stretch at the end of a workout and guide her through breathing exercises, some tai chi or even a little bit of yoga.
“They really offer a pretty comprehensive program for her,” Kolodziej said. Without that, “(Anna) wouldn’t have the opportunity to exercise anywhere. She would just have to come home everyday and just do nothing.”
ServiceNet CEO Susan Stubbs said trimming the gym program seemed to be the least painful way to deal with the loss of state money.
“We thought it was the least harmful option instead of increasing caseloads,” for staff in other ServiceNet areas, she said, noting that 75 percent of all of ServiceNet’s budget goes to salaries. “In programs like this — there is no fat. When you look at needing to cut back — you are not going to lower peoples’ salaries, you can’t lower your rent, you can’t lower your electric bill.”
ServiceNet started the Fit Together program about eight years ago. It’s open to the public, but more than 50 percent of the members have some kind of physical or mental disability, according to Stubbs.
Gym members determine how much they are able to pay based on a sliding scale of $10 to $40 per month. No proof of income is required and nobody is turned away based on inability to pay, Stubbs said. Kolodziej pays $5 a month for unlimited access to the gym.
The exact amount of the state funding cut could shift in coming months, Stubbs said, which could alter plans. She declined to say how much ServiceNet will save by making changes to the gym program or what other adjustments it is making, though she did say no other programs would be cut.
The change in gym hours is expected to go into effect by mid September, but ServiceNet is still figuring out how the staffed time will be distributed throughout the week, said Amy Swisher, vice president of advancement at ServiceNet.
At first the plan was to eliminate the two full-time staff positions at Fit Together altogether and replace them with electronic key cards to allow members to use the facilities on their own, Stubbs said.
But protests from some the gym’s patrons and their supporters last month prompted the agency to agree to keep the gym staffed for up to nine hours each week instead.
“We feel that even with limited staffing it is still going to have the same impact because many people have already learned how to use the machines by themselves,” said Stubbs. And, she added, many of the members already have one-on-one staff from other programs who work with them, she said. The outcry came from those who don’t have that support and were counting on the gym staff to work with their loved ones, she said.
“This is an organizational commitment,” said Swisher, “and even in the face of a tight budget — the decision was not to cut the program — but to keep the program in a thoughtful way. It’s not the same as it was, but it’s still there.”
But for those like Anna Kolodziej, who cannot work out on their own, the change could be harsh, says Sally Kolodziej. She works full time as a preschool teacher, she says, and doesn’t have the schedule flexibility to accompany her daughter regularly. After just a few months of attending to Fit Together, Kolodziej said, Anna is starting to see her workouts pay off.
She gets excited about exercise, has more stamina and is able to bond with the staff members, Kolodziej said. “It makes a difference when you are in a place where you feel welcome.”
Kolodziej says there are no similar, affordable programs to turn to.
“There is no other place,” she said. “If she went to the Y we would still have to pay a trainer $20 for every 30 minutes, so we would be paying a couple thousand dollars a year to get her motivated.”
Calls to area gyms confirmed that Fit Together is the only program of its kind here.
Aidan O’Donoghue, 20, who has Down syndrome, is another gym member who needs guidance to use the machines and will be affected by the change, say his parents.
Since starting at the gym last January on his doctor’s recommendation, O’Donoghue has slowly begun shedding weight and building muscle, says his father, Phil O’Donoghue.
“He is losing weight in a very healthy way and we attribute it to Fit Together. We wish we had learned about it years earlier. It has just been a godsend to us.”
The staff have been instrumental in motivating and guiding Aidan, says O’Donoghue.
“What makes it so great is that it is on a drop-in basis, so since we live in Florence we can come over here at the drop of a hat and whoever is here, they work one-on-one with Aidan,” he said.
Like Sally Kolodziej, he and his wife, Valle Dwight, were dismayed by the news that the program is downsizing.
“While there are other gyms available, they don’t get the support that they need,” said Dwight.
Another gym member, Jalyn Morin, 32, of Northampton said he has used the gym for two years as part of his mental health recovery.
Fit Together, he says, is a place where he can work out without feeling self-conscious. He could go to the gym at Holyoke Community College, where he is a student, he says, but he wouldn’t get the same support. “I like to come here, I like the people. I like the classes,” he said.
Morin says he also has grown to depend on his time at the gym to avoid isolation on the weekends. Since he started using Fit Together’s facilities, he has lost more than 70 pounds, he says.
“My motivation has gone up, I’m an honor student, I have a work-study now. I don’t think I would have all of that without this place.”
Addressing those types of needs is exactly why ServiceNet opened the gym about eight years ago, says Stubbs. It recognized that there was a lack of gyms that catered to people with mental health and developmental differences, she says.
“As far as know, we were the first gym in America that was geared to people with disabilities.”
In the years before the gym opened, she says, she worked with the organization to round up volunteers to take clients to work out in area gyms, but found that many of them felt uncomfortable, self-conscious or unwelcome in typical fitness centers.
“We had always been challenged to find ways for people with mental illness to be healthier,” said Stubbs. “We came up with the idea of having a place where people could feel comfortable and there was no judgment.”
Fit Together first opened on Route 9 in Hadley in a space that ended up being too big and too costly for the number of members it attracted, says Swisher.
“It was a terrific space, but underutilized, so we moved to a smaller space,” said Swisher.
That site is the location in Florence it still uses today.
Though plans for Fit Together are in flux at the moment, ServiceNet is committed to keeping the gym open Swisher said.
“Health and wellness are a key priority in addressing the needs of all the people we serve,” she said. “Fit together is not going away, it is changing.”
ServiceNet accepts donations for its programs. Those interested can visit http://www.servicenet.org and follow the donate link and designate their gift to Fit Together.
Lisa Spear can be reached at lspear@gazettenet.com.