‘Opportunity to live more productive lives’: We Grow Dreams provides jobs for people with disabilities

Melanie and Scott Grotto were driving around West Chicago in 2020 as a young married couple looking for a house.

A place on Washington Street caught Melanie’s eye.

“’Oh, look at that yellow building, it’s so fun,’” she exclaimed.

It is fun — and for two decades it’s been an important spot for a lot of people.

The yellow building holds the offices of We Grow Dreams, a 5-acre garden center at 1055 W. Washington St.

Since its founding in 2004 as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, We Grow Dreams has provided people with intellectual and physical disabilities with countless hours of training and employment, helping execute the myriad tasks required to operate the nursery.

After the Grottos settled into a home down the street from We Grow Dreams, Melanie Grotto responded to a sign at the nursery seeking help. She’s now its general manager.

“It’s hard, but it’s very rewarding,” she said.

Grotto oversees about 47 team members, from teenagers to those in their 40s, who are accompanied by job coaches depending upon their disabilities, plus a small group of staff in the office, at the counter, and tending to chores in greenhouses and garden plots.

We Grow Dreams works with the Transitions program at Wheaton Warrenville Unit District 200 and Soaring Eagle Academy in Lombard. Team members work mornings from Tuesday through Saturday, up to about 10 hours a month. Some have been with We Grow Dreams since it started.

Lucia Baker, a vocational coordinator with District 200’s Transitions program, calls it “an amazing partnership to provide opportunities for vocational training, social skill experiences and communication in a work setting.”

“The big part about it,” Grotto said, “especially when we get people at a young age, is they get paid, they earn credits towards Social Security, so then they achieve a certain number of credits by age 26, they can get to a higher level of Medicare.

“That was what the founding families had initially desired for their children, because it would set them up for their long-term care needs, to be more successful.”

Donna Jarmusz was among those original founders, a handful of parents of children with disabilities. Organizations such as the Western DuPage Special Recreation Association (WDSRA) and the Northeast DuPage Special Recreation Association (NDSRA) provided activities, but the founders were concerned about their children’s future.

“I determined long ago that our young adults with disabilities could not depend on government programs, government grants, those kinds of things,” said Jarmusz, now living in North Carolina but still active on the We Grow Dreams board.

“We really needed as parents to take responsibility to keep them not just busy, but give them the opportunity to live more productive lives,” she said.

Researching a variety of potential enterprises, the group found an existing greenhouse set to be plowed under and sold. They did heavy lifting to obtain financing — “a miracle,” Jarmusz said — to purchase the property, and established We Grow Dreams.

“Besides our mission, our philosophy is that everyone is employable,” Jarmusz said. “So if you’re a team member and you don’t like putting your hands in soil or touching plants, that’s not a problem. We’ll find another job for you.”

James Wilson can attest to that. The Glen Ellyn resident is a self-described “jack-of-all-trades” since he started at We Grow Dreams in 2020.

Diagnosed with Asperger’s syndrome as a boy, the 2003 Wheaton North graduate earned a certificate from College of DuPage in nursery and garden center management.

“This is my element,” Wilson said.

“I could be weeding, I could be dealing with plants, I could be doing repairs,” he said. “I’ve literally done all of that — this week. I did a major repair on Wednesday. I composted yesterday.”

The next day, in fact, We Grow Dreams Executive Director Gregg Bettcher drafted Wilson for a ride back to his Wheaton home.

Bettcher, who had retired after 35 years in industrial sales, sat on the WDSRA foundation board when he heard Jarmusz deliver a presentation on We Grow Dreams.

“I thought, ‘My goodness, what an incredible place,’” Bettcher said.

The business model captivated him as it did Grotto. For the past 11 years, he’s been its executive director.

“I said, ‘How much work can this be?’

Quite a lot, it turns out. A current focus is a capital campaign with a goal to raise $2 million. Bettcher’s wife, Gail, heads the company’s annual Bowlathon fundraiser in February, and the nursery does periodic mobile sales, such as at the July 12 Elmhurst Garden Club 2026 Garden Walk and Faire. But it’s not enough to fund current needs.

“Our facilities are suffering from age, but we keep them going,” Gregg Bettcher said. “We have excellent contributors that make our year-to-year operations possible, but there’s things that are now to the point where they just need to be addressed.

“We just can’t keep patching the roof. Sooner or later, you have to put up a new roof, and we have several of our buildings that require attention,” he said.

Another goal is to build regular restroom facilities or a “community room” to replace a rented trailer with chemical toilets and provide a place to cool off in the summer.

Like a productive future, We Grow Dreams’ employees deserve that.

“Each one of them wants to feel a sense of accomplishment, whether it’s folding a box or filling a pot,” Jarmusz said. “It gives them great satisfaction to see, literally, the fruits of their labor — how they can plant a seed or a plug and see this gorgeous plant.

“They want to feel a sense of accomplishment and contribute to our community and our society just like everyone does.”