SHARON — When Sharon Hospital was sold to for-profit Essent Healthcare Inc. in June 2003, state law required that the $16 million in proceeds be transferred to a nonprofit organization with a similar purpose — to promote healthier individuals and communities.
To meet that mandate, Foundation for Community Health (FCH) was formed to steward that mostly unrestricted windfall for the benefit of the rural, 17-town region, where Northwest Connecticut and the Greater Harlem Valley in New York meet, served by the hospital.
Fast-forward two decades and the Sharon-based philanthropic organization, under the stewardship of Nancy Heaton, its president and CEO, has granted more than $21 million through 609 grants to 118 organizations and invested thousands of staff hours to support better health to communities, many of which have historically been underserved.
An auditor’s Dec. 31, 2022, financial statement showed the foundation’s total assets at $32.6 million.
In 2023 alone, FCH’s 20th anniversary, the foundation awarded more than $1.6 million in grants to 30 grantee partners, including $650,000 to help establish the North Canaan Health Center. Since 2017, FCH has awarded about $2 million toward the North Canaan Health Center. The long awaited opening is expected in spring 2024.
Support also extended beyond the grants. FCH helped its grantee partners secure $1.9 million in additional grant funding and nearly $36,000 toward programs. Eight executive directors received one-on-one leadership support, and four sessions of the foundation’s Community of Practice assisted nonprofit leaders.
“Our goal has really been more focused on strengthening the capacity and sustainability of these organizations so they can do their work more efficiently,” said Heaton.
Conditions that influence health span beyond medical care, such as access to food, safe and stable housing, and the opportunity for positive childhood experiences. According to FCH, “On average, 45 percent of renters in our community pay more than 35% of their income on housing.”
“The pandemic shone light on all the issues and cracks and needs, and how fractured our system is,” noted Natashea Winters, FCH’s director of programs and learning.
2023: a ‘year of newness’
Heaton described 2023 as “a year of newness,” with new tools to capture support beyond the grant, new community members including two new board members and one new staff member, and five new grantee partners.
Based on feedback from its grantee partners, FCH developed a Community of Practice for Nonprofit Leaders, offering one-to-one leadership support to executive directors of organizations. The foundation also helped grantee partners secure nearly $2 million in additional grant funding.
“I think it speaks to the value we can provide. We call it support beyond the grants,” Winters noted. “No two organizations are the same. It’s part of the uniqueness of our region and uniqueness of our foundation.”
Neither are the communities served by FCH the same. For instance, she said,“Dover is our largest community and our neediest community.”
The organization’s board of directors comprises representatives from throughout its vast region.
In 2023, two new faces joined the FCH board: Dover Plains, New York, resident Jill Fieldstein, business manager of the Louis August Jonas Foundation in Rhinebeck, New York; and Dr. Zachary McClain of Falls Village, medical director of the Wieler Health Center at The Hotchkiss School in Lakeville.
Extending support to nonprofits’ leaders
Last October, FCH granted $81,500 to eight nonprofits through its Capacity Building Grant Program. Since its start in 2021, the program has granted $423,070 to 21 organizations by supporting important work including strategic planning, infrastructure needs, leadership support and organizational restructuring,
FCH has been “a consistent supporter” of Greenwoods Counseling & Referrals Inc., which provides affordable mental health care, education and related services throughout Litchfield County, according to its executive director John Simoncelli.
The $15,000 grant his organization received from FCH last October helped with a much-needed expansion, Simoncelli explained.
“We’ve grown a lot in the seven years since I’ve been here. When we started, we had about four employees and now we have 25,” he explained. “We’ve maxed out our space in Litchfield.”
The recent grant was instrumental in the opening of a satellite office in Torrington, “and eventually in Winsted as well.” With the new offices, he said, comes a need to hire staff, rent the spaces and furnish them: “That’s what the money is being used for, these expansion efforts.”
Simoncelli praised the work of FCH. “They’ve been a part of our growth all along, and I can’t say enough about how they have evolved their grantmaking process. In my mind it has been revolutionary. I feel that Natashea has a great sense of what we do and how the money is being spent.”
Helping seniors, protecting immigrants
The Lakeville-based Chore Service Inc. was the recipient of a $12,000 grant from FCH last fall. The funding, said Executive Director Jane MacLaren, has been critical for helping seniors and disabled residents live safely and independently in their homes.
“Our federal funding has been reduced by 33%, which is difficult as the need is increasing. Last year we served 137 clients in seven towns and provided part-time work to 30 workers and 5,181 hours of service,” MacLaren noted.
“The foundation’s support has been instrumental to Chore’s commitment to increasing community impact, maintaining organizational health and long-term financial viability. Many people do not have the means to pay for services, so they call Chore. We provide services regardless of ability to pay, so for many, we are a last resort to remaining at home.”
A $15,000 Capacity Building Grant was also distributed to the Columbia County Sanctuary Movement in Hudson, New York.
“We are really grateful for this fund,” said Diana Laura Cruz, co-executive director of programs and services. “CCSM has experienced a rise in racist and xenophobic attacks against our immigrant community. Funds have been able to support our staff to rest and recover while also giving us the opportunity to train community members to keep us safe.”
This story has been updated to correct Natashea Winters' name and title.
Image courtesy of Foundation for Community Health
A 22.5-acre property at 60 Millerton Road in Sharon is at the center of a trust dispute over the sale of the land to Jasper Johns-related arts nonprofit Low Road Sharon Inc.
Before any sale can proceed, however, the Litchfield Hills Probate Court must resolve a dispute among members of the family trust that owns the Millerton Road property. A hearing is scheduled for June 30, when Judge Jordan Richards is expected to decide whether to approve the sale and rule on objections filed by one of the trustees.
According to probate court documents, Peter Bartram has objected to a petition filed by his sisters, Carey Meltzer and Amy Bartram, seeking court approval to sell the property held by the Hillside Farm Trust. In a June 11 filing, Bartram said the proposed transaction is the second attempt to sell the property to the same buyer after an earlier effort was blocked by the court since he did not agree to the sale.
"In September 2025, the Trustees accepted an offer of $615,000 from the same buyer, Low Road Sharon Inc.," Bartram wrote in his objection to his sisters’ second attempted sale. "All beneficiaries except the Movant [Peter] signed the Beneficiary Approval. The Court denied the proposed modification on November 26, 2025.
The new petition seeks approval for essentially the same sale, with the purchase price of $650,000, an increase of $35,000 since the last attempted sale.
Neither the parties to the probate case nor Conley Rollins, who has represented Low Road Sharon in previous town applications and is the COO and CFO of the Brooklyn Museum, provided comment. Rollins also did not respond to questions about whether the proposed purchase would be connected to the artists' retreat.
The property at 60 Millerton Road includes an unoccupied 1840 white clapboard farmhouse near the Silver Lake Shores neighborhood. Together with two much smaller adjoining parcels included in the proposed sale, it has been held by the Hillside Farm Trust since 2013.
The trust was established in 2012 by Maynard and Barbara Bartram, who were both raised in the colonial home, which sits prominently at the corner of Millerton Road and Silver Lake Shore Road.
Following Maynard Bartram's death in 2021 and the death of their daughter, Sarah Noyes, in 2022, Carey Meltzer, Peter Bartram and Amy Bartram have served as the remaining trustees. Peter Bartram, however, was removed as a trustee by court order in 2024 after he removed several trees from the property to protect a barn without his siblings’ approval.
As part of the June 30 proceedings, Judge Richards is also expected to consider Bartram's request to be reinstated as a trustee.
In an April 30 court filing, Meltzer and Amy Bartram argued the property has become a financial burden for the trust and they have a right to put it on the market.
"The farm is a significant and depreciating asset that incurs ongoing carrying costs including property taxes, insurance, maintenance and utilities," they argued.
The three parcels included in the proposed sale are assessed at more than $813,000, with the main 22.5-acre parcel accounting for nearly all of that value. As of June 25, the property was listed for sale through Elyse Harney Real Estate for $795,000.
The proposed purchase has drawn interest because the Millerton Road property directly borders land already designated for Low Road Sharon's planned artists' retreat.
The retreat, approved by Sharon Planning and Zoning in 2017, encompasses approximately 171 acres spread across six parcels that stretch from Low Road to the shoreline of Mudge Pond. The approval allows up to 24 artists in residence at one time and does not permit public access to the campus. The property would be able to contain up to six housing units. Each housing unit is permitted to accommodate up to three people.
Any proposal to expand or materially alter the footprint approved in 2017 would require additional review by the Planning and Zoning Commission and a public hearing, outgoing Land Use Administrator Jamie Casey said.
Low Road Sharon has not indicated whether the Millerton Road property would become part of the retreat or serve another purpose.
Johns, who has lived in Sharon for more than three decades, is widely regarded as one of America's most influential living artists. According to the 2017 statement of proposed use submitted to the town, the residency program is intended to become "one of the leading artists' residency programs in the United States," comparable to MacDowell in New Hampshire and Yaddo in Saratoga Springs, New York.
An illustration of the proposed artists' retreat on Jasper Johns' 171 acres in Sharon after his death, included in the original 2017 site plan for the project. Provided
The proposal envisioned a staff of roughly 20 to 25 people, some of whom would work at an administrative functions and event space based at a downtown Sharon office.
Construction is already underway on that downtown property, including a new building which is going up where the former Bargain Barn thrift store was located at 1 Low Road. The two-building complex, approved after months of public hearings last year, will primarily serve as the nonprofit's administrative center and include a venue designed to host occasional public cultural events that would be free to the public.
Low Road Sharon was incorporated in 2022 to establish a short-term residency program for artists across multiple disciplines. According to its 2024 tax filing, the organization reported approximately $32 million in assets. A separate philanthropic organization founded by Johns in 2004, the Low Road Foundation, reported approximately $255.5 million in assets in 2024.
The commercial district project boasts an impressive development team. Lead architecture outfit Johnston Marklee & Associates is a Los Angeles-based firm with an accomplished international portfolio of projects like the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, Kunstmuseum Basel, the Institute of Contemporary Arts at the University of Pennsylvania and many others.
New Haven’s Reed-Hilderbrand is the landscape architect for the Low Road development, and has designed for a wide variety of clients, including Yale University, Duke University and the Hudson Valley’s famed outdoor museum, the Storm King Art Center.
The owner’s representative Envoie Projects also manages high-profile arts facilities such as Harlem’s Apollo Theater, The Delacorte Theater in Central Park, and again, the Storm King Art Center.
A rendering of the proposed administrative building and events facility on Low Road in Sharon's commercial district, developed by project lead architect Johnston Marklee & Associates. Provided
Construction at 1 Low Road began earlier this year for an administrative center and occasional performance center and events space for Jasper Johns-related arts nonprofit Low Road Sharon Inc.Alec Linden
Proffitt and her husband and business partner, Robert Bristow, are well-known leaders in the art and architecture communities, and their home, studio and workshop in Lakeville; store and office at 16 Main St. in Salisbury; and gallery space in Norfolk are vibrant hubs for arts and design in the region.
Proffitt has been coming to the area since she was a teenager. Originally from Puerto Rico, her family moved to the New York City area in the 1970’s. Her artist and architect father encouraged her interests in art and design and her deep desire to create. At school, she excelled in math and art and soon realized that this was all she wanted to do. “Think logically and then break the mold with creativity,” she said.
Armed with a degree in visual art from Trinity College, she pursued advanced studies at Berkeley and Pratt before receiving a master’s degree in architecture from Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Virginia, where she met Bristow. Both landed apprenticeships in Boston and were drawn to the arts community in Norfolk centered around the Yale Summer Arts Program. The area quickly became their personal and family anchor.
They started Poesis, a furniture design and manufacturing studio, with a small loan from her mother. They landed a major house project and soon met a hotelier at a party who hired them on the spot to design a hotel in Washington, D.C.
Proffitt said, “I was hooked because it combined everything I wanted to do creatively: design experiences in the broadest sense with all the supporting pieces of the puzzle — furniture, objects, art. My father felt that architecture was the Renaissance profession: It holds the seeds of art, design, engineering and all the other ingredients. For me, it all starts with art.”
A rendering of King Winery, one of Pilar Proffitt’s current interior design projects.Provided
Proffitt is devoted to the area. She and Bristow raised their family in Lakeville. Their daughter Grace, a sculptor, attended Hotchkiss and is pursuing her MFA at University of Pennsylvania. Their daughter Ellis, also a graduate of Hotchkiss and Trinity, is a mathematician and aspiring actress in Los Angeles; and their son Sam attended Salisbury School and is a junior at Trinity, majoring in art history with a minor in architecture. They all are carrying forward the family’s passion for arts, architecture and design.
Proffitt’s interior design work and unique furniture pieces welcome visitors at Hotchkiss’ Art Center, the Scoville Memorial Library, her own wHole hOuse shop in Salisbury and, soon, across the street in the new Jam Food Shop, which is expected to open this fall.
The region’s many museums and galleries include some of Proffitt’s favorites, from Mass MoCA and the Clark to Salisbury’s Geary, Mad Rose in Millerton, Jack Shainman in Kinderhook and Art Omi in Ghent. Proffitt loves the connections and new opportunities brought to the community by the increase in full-time residents, as well as impromptu get-togethers with friends — recently watching a Knicks playoff game at the tavern bar at the White Hart. Moments like that keep her grounded here.
In addition to the White Hart, Proffitt is a fan of area restaurants, including Fern for a quick pasta at the bar; Isabela in Amenia, where Michelin-starred chef Jose Ramirez Ruiz is from Puerto Rico; and Clare de Boer’s Stissing House in Pine Plains.
A perfect day for Proffitt is spent working in her studio overlooking Lake Wononscopomuc, without distractions, rain or shine. It is a quiet and peaceful place that supports her many architecture and design projects. When asked what she would say to a younger version of herself just starting a career, she responded, “Don’t be so shy. As one of my professors told me, ‘Sometimes you just have to crash the party.’ Draw, write, run, play tennis. And travel!”
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