20 Years of Providing Jobs for the Disabled.

• Author: ESS, CHARLIE
• Position: Assets Inc.

Kevin Jicha finally went out and bought himself a condominium last October. He moved in just before Christmas. He gets on a bus and works the day shift hovering over an industrial-sized stainless steel sink, scraping charred lasagna like old gaskets from rims of heavy pans, or wheeling cartloads of trash and foodscraps down the red-brick tile corridors that lead away from the cafeteria at Anchorage's Providence Hospital.

If this doesn't sound like big stuff, let's assume for the moment that instead of struggling with deadlines, corporate spending plans or running your own business, that you were born with a developmental disability, some genetic glitch, say, in your 21st chromosome, that hangs on you like chains--makes you run wild at the mouth, keeps you from acquiring your own home, a car, the job you want. Imagine, for the moment, that you can't read these words.

Then, if you can imagine the task of finding jobs for the developmentally disabled in the community--and having the community benefit from their services--you might envision the goals of Assets Inc. Founded by parents, friends and other community members to offer opportunities to the disabled, the nonprofit company celebrates its 20th anniversary this year.

Since its beginnings, Assets (It was called ASETS in the early years, an acronym for Alaska Specialized Education and Training.) has grown to be the 78th of Alaska's top 100 companies and boasts of 312 employees, more than half of which are among the company's staff. A pivotal development in the company was the instigation of its first service contracts, which place the individuals as a group in various state, federal and private entities. Jicha, for instance, is one of 40-some Assets employees at Providence, which is one of a dozen contract sites that include the likes of the Elmendorf Air Force Commissary and the Alaska Court System.

With nine employees, one of the sites, a print shop within the Assets building on East Northern Lights, produces calendars, posters and the hunting and fishing regulations put out by the Alaska Department of Fish and Game. "We're open for business," says Marsha Miesch, Assets' director of development. "Anybody can walk in and we'll come up with a bid."

But Assets has also expanded its own programs to help individuals whose children need help with emotional disorders, and to help with housing adults. The Assets employment service, meanwhile, puts individuals to work in businesses like Carrs...