Tunnel to Towers Gifts First West Coast Smart Home to Veteran

Tunnel to Towers Foundation completed and handed over its first West Coast smart home to Coupeville resident and veteran Terry Knight, who moved into the accessible house with his wife and two children on December 20. The home was remodeled to match Knight's needs after an 85 day turnaround led by Van Pelt Construction LLC, with donated appliances and labor contributions that helped prepare the house in time for the holidays.

Knight, who joined the Navy Reserve as a senior at Oak Harbor High School in 1985 and later served as a combat engineer and combat medic, received an ALS diagnosis in 2013 and was medically retired from the Army Reserve in 2014. The remodeled house includes ADA accessible features and integrated smart home controls intended to improve mobility and communication. Installed features include wheelchair friendly showers, a lowering stove top, heated floors, and smartphone or iPad control of lights, locks and other systems that reduce barriers to daily living.

Van Pelt Construction coordinated the physical alterations under the foundation's design requirements while Tunnel to Towers managed the overall construction and accessibility planning. Local contractors and community members provided labor and materials, enabling the project to meet an accelerated schedule and deliver the mortgage free home to Knight and his family just before the end of the year. Knight described the move as "a homecoming" given his local roots in the Oak Harbor area.

The project is significant for Island County both as a direct quality of life improvement for a local family and as an example of public private cooperation addressing veteran housing needs. Accessible smart home technology can substitute for some hands on assistance by enabling remote control of essential systems, which may reduce household care burdens and help families remain in their communities. The foundation's mission of gifting mortgage free smart homes to catastrophically injured veterans and first responders shows how nonprofit capital and donated labor can accelerate adaptations that might otherwise face funding or permitting delays.

For local policy makers and service providers the Coupeville build underscores the potential gains from combining veteran services, affordable accessible housing efforts, and small business contributions. Rapid projects like this one create short term construction work locally and produce long term savings in care needs for severely disabled residents, while keeping families anchored in Island County neighborhoods.