This spring, Do Something Inc.’s Launch House will have a new place to call home in a state-of-the-art building, thanks to a generous community member who will let them use the space for free.

The location of the Launch House will remain the same at 161 E. Gould St. But a new, one-story building will replace the older building there now.

Ted Seastrom is in the process of purchasing the Gould Street property along with the one next door at 153 E. Gould St.

He plans to name the new building at 161 E. Gould the Carol Lynn House, in honor of his late mother.

“I love her,” Seastrom said about his reason why.

“I just thought it would be cool if everyone would say, ‘We’re going to Carol Lynn House.’ ‘The meeting is at Carol Lynn House.’ Every time they say it, my mom will be remembered,” he said.

Seastrom just moved to Brown County from Indianapolis last April, but he has several longtime family ties here. He said he was looking at the 161 E. Gould Street property as a potential investment. He owns the property management company, Possum Trot Properties LLC.

He did not realize that Launch House, a resource for people dealing with substance abuse, was operating out of the building until he pulled up to tour the property with the real estate agent.

Seastrom called the Launch House number and spoke with Melissa Tatman, who does the intakes for the Launch House and meets people there who are seeking help.

“That turned into an hourlong conversation. It was just amazing. Then I talked with Cory (Joy) and then I ended up meeting and talking with Lisa (Hall). It just expanded, expanded and expanded,” Seastrom said.

Michelle and Cory Joy lost their oldest son, Caleb, to a heroin overdose over Labor Day weekend 2017. They started organizing Do Something Inc. not long after his passing, and the Launch House idea grew out of that movement.

Lisa Hall serves on Do Something Inc.’s board.

“What a gift to this community Ted is bringing, and certainly to the recovery community who has gone through a really challenging time with COVID — this isolation and quarantine,” Hall said.

Sesatrom said he had been thinking that he, too, wanted to “do something” philanthropic. “I thought, ‘Well, this is it,’” he said.

Do Something, a not-for-profit, was struggling to raise money to purchase the Gould Street property. They moved into the building late in 2019.

An inspection had turned up some concerns about the current structure. Then, with COVID, “we just could not do the fundraising we had hoped to do. We just were not in a position to buy it. … We were just going to continue to lease the property,” Hall said.

‘Making life better’

The new building will be a place for any group to meet that is working to make life better here, Seastrom said — “kind of an emphasis on recovery and support groups, but any groups, service clubs, anybody, that building is dedicated to solving problems and finding opportunities for Brown County and making life better in Brown County,” he said.

Scheduling meetings at Carol Lynn House will happen online. Organizations that use the space will have a designated representative with a key card. “Then, you have essentially an autonomous building,” Seastrom said.

The goal is to make Carol Lynn House a “Brown County structure” that fits into its surroundings, but also has modern technology and safety features.

Carol Lynn House will have a large, wall-mounted television with wireless networking that can display laptop presentations and Zoom meetings.

“We’re going to open up still in the COVID era, so we’ll have to be totally compliant with that, as well as all accessibility requirements for things like ADA. Even in the future you, will have blended Zoom meetings because some people will want to be in person and some people won’t,” Seastrom said.

There will be folding tables and chairs for groups to use and arrange, and a room for children to play with a large window.

“A lot of people are single parents and they have to take their kid with them when they go to a meeting. This way, they can do that,” Seastrom said.

Hall said there is also a possibility that the Carol Lynn House could be designated as a spot for children and parents to meet who are allowed visits by the Department of Child Services.

Carol Lynn House can also be used for recovery meetings, like Alcoholics Anonymous. Some of those groups are already meeting at the Launch House, Hall said.

Having a new hub for substance abuse recovery is coming at a critical time for the recovery community. Multiple overdoses and deaths caused by overdoses have been reported since the start of the pandemic.

“Melissa has seen Battlefield for Recovery (meetings) drop significantly in numbers because people have returned to active addiction,” Hall said.

“This has been really, again, a challenging time for substance use disorder.”

Seastrom said Carol Lynn House can act as an overflow for groups that might use the nearby Brown County Community Foundation as meeting space. “They have a much larger, full-on facility that can do things our facility wouldn’t be able to do. Our focus is kind of a little more on the smaller scale,” he said. “If a group wants to meet at the foundation and that time slot is booked and we’re open, they can come over to us.”

The Brown County Public Library, across the parking lot from Launch House, also offers meeting spaces downstairs.

Building it up

Do Something now has a new website, dosomethingnashville.org where people can find contact numbers, forms and other information.

While construction is ongoing, Hall said Do Something will work to help people virtually.

She said this year is a time for Do Something Inc. to build up as an organization.

“We’re going to strengthen our governance and our board. We just need to. It was kind of people who had a passion or a heart to “do something” that said yes. Now, we see in order to qualify for grant funding, to be formidable in the area of recovery, we need to create collaboration, we need to strengthen our board and we need to strengthen our team,” Hall said.

By not paying rent, Hall said the hope is that Do Something can get more phones and pay more peer counselors to answer those phone calls from people in need of help. Tatman will lead and train them.

“We know there will be a lot of people coming out of this pandemic looking for recovery solutions,” Hall said.

Do Something Inc. is also working with the Indiana Recovery Network to become a hub of substance abuse disorder resources for neighboring counties.

“There’s some funding that could help us develop that team I’m talking about that we would pay,” Hall said.

When the demolition equipment shows up, Hall said she wanted the community to know that Launch House was not going away for good.

“We’re actually ramping up and it’s at a very exciting time for us,” she said.

Logistics and legalities

Anyone interested in using Carol Lynn House as a meeting spot can visit Seastrom’s website, TedSeastrom.com, to contact him. The first meetings to be scheduled will be for the Launch House and Do Something Inc.

His only restriction on meetings at Carol Lynn House: Nothing political. “Otherwise, it’s pretty open,” he said.

Carol Lynn House will be privately owned by Possum Trot Properties LLC.

“There’s no fees, there’s no membership. It’s essentially like any business that would let you use their conference room for a meeting,” Seastrom said.

Users will need to sign a use agreement, and rules will be in place. “You have to come in early and set up … clean up and put everything away, wipe down, and if they don’t follow the rules, they won’t be there,” Seastrom said.

Before Carol Lynn House can open this spring, Seastrom will need to get some governmental approvals, like changing the property’s zoning from B1 to B2. The design of the home will also have to be approved by the Nashville Development Review Committee.

The building architect and builder will be announced when ground is broken.

Seastrom plans to use the 153 E. Gould property lot for parking and will tear down the building currently there.

“I am sure that building has some remaining functionality to it, but you can’t do something like Carol Lynn House without parking. I feel like that is a worthy use of that,” Seastrom said.

He said he sees Carol Lynn House being a meeting space for groups of up to 30.

“People who think, ‘Gee, why won’t we do something about this?’ form a little group, start having meetings, and you do something about whatever that little issue you want to see some progress on,” Seastrom said.

“You don’t have to wait until some big government program comes along. You can just be a group of people who have some ideas and want to talk about it, get things happening. That ground-level energy, I think, is really what is going to make a big difference.”