affordable housing

Our Home, Our Future: Toli Fliakos

Voices from our Salisbury community about the housing we need for a healthy, vibrant future

Very few of our neighbors have had a life as adventurous as Toli Fliakos. Toli spent his youth between Greece and Tanzania where his family had a tobacco plantation. When local politics turned their economic lives upside down he found himself, at the age of 15, penniless and stranded in London where he was studying to perfect his English. Through the efforts of teachers who believed in him and the kindness of a ship-owner who offered him a free ride to America on a freighter, he crossed the Atlantic alone to finish high school at Hotchkiss on a scholarship. He went on to Yale, again on a scholarship. While at Yale he spent his summers at Hotchkiss working for a program for inner city kids. He got to know and love our town because the community was involved with the program.

He has lived all over the country, raised three daughters and worked many interesting jobs. The strong roots he developed here during high school and those youthful summers pulled him back to Salisbury upon retirement.

Over the years he has often benefited from the kindness of others. He says, “kindness has given me faith in people. I’ll trust anybody until they give me a reason not to. Because of how people impacted my life I always feel I owe something back to the world. Helping others has become my way of life. To this day when I get down I force myself to find someone I can help and then I feel much better.” Once back in Salisbury he worked for Chore Service and volunteered for Habitat for Humanity, eventually becoming a board member. Through his volunteer work he became embedded in the community and expanded his circle of friends and acquaintances. Aside from friendship, his network has enabled him to supplement his social security income by driving people to airports, train stations, doctors’ appointments, etc. When asked, he donates his services to organizations or people in need.

His network has also helped him find very scarce affordable housing. He now worries about what he will do as he ages. He says, “The only reason I’ve managed to remain here is because of the benevolence of people in the community. Without those connections I would have been forced to leave. New people eager to live and work here don’t have these links.”

Toli’s experience underscores the positive difference people can make in a person’s life. There is joy in both giving and receiving help from friends and strangers. Few things can make you feel better than changing someone’s life for the better. Supporting the creation of affordable homes for seniors like Toli, who add value to our community, and the working people we need for our town to thrive, is a wonderful way to feel good and make a positive difference for our town.

 

Mary Close Oppenheimer is a local artist who has been part of the Lakeville/Salisbury community for 30 years.

affordable housing
The views expressed here are not necessarily those of The Lakeville Journal and The Journal does not support or oppose candidates for public office.

Latest News

To mow or not to mow?

To mow or not to mow?

A partially mowed meadow in early spring provides habitat for wildlife while helping to keep invasive plants in check.

Dee Salomon

Love it or hate it, there is no denying the several blankets of snow this winter were beautiful, especially as they visually muffled some of the damage they caused in the first place.There appears to be tree damage — some minor and some major — in many places, and now that we can move around, the pre-spring cleanup begins. Here, a heavy snow buildup on our sun porch roof crashed onto the shrubs below, snapping off branches and cleaving a boxwood in half, flattening it.

The other area that has been flattened by the snow is the meadow, now heading into its fourth year of post-lawn alterations. A short recap on its genesis: I simply stopped mowing a half-acre of lawn, planted some flowering plants, spread little bluestem seeds and, far less simply, obsessively pluck out invasive plants such as sheep sorrel and stilt grass. And while it’s not exactly enchanting, it is flourishing, so much so that I cannot bring myself to mow.

Keep ReadingShow less
the ungardener

Where the mat meets the market

Where the mat meets the market

Kathy Reisfeld

Elena Spellman

In a barn on Maple Avenue in Great Barrington, Kathy Reisfeld merges two unlikely worlds: wealth management and yoga, teaching clients and students alike how stability — financial and emotional — comes from practice.

Her life sits at an intersection many assume can’t exist: high finance and yoga. One world is often reduced to greed, the other to “woo-woo” stretching. Yet in conversation, she makes both feel grounded, less like opposites and more like two languages describing the same human need for stability.

Keep ReadingShow less
our community

Capitol hosts first-ever staging of Civil War love story

Capitol hosts first-ever staging of Civil War love story

Playwright Cinzi Lavin, left, poses with Kathleen Kelly, director of ‘A Goodnight Kiss.’

Jack Sheedy

Litchfield County playwright Cinzi Lavin’s “A Goodnight Kiss,” based on letters exchanged between a Civil War soldier and the woman who became his wife, premiered in 2025 to sold-out audiences in Goshen, where the couple once lived. Now the original cast, directed by Goshen resident Kathleen Kelly, will present the play beneath the gold dome of Connecticut’s Capitol in Hartford as part of the state’s America250 commemoration — marking what organizers believe may be the first such performance at the Capitol.

“I don’t believe any live performances of an actual play (at the Capitol) have happened,” said Elizabeth Conroy, administrative assistant at the Office of Legislative Management, who coordinates Capitol events.

Keep ReadingShow less
performances
google preferred source

Want more of our stories on Google? Click here to make us a Preferred Source.

Hunt Library launches VideoWall for filmmakers

Hunt Library launches VideoWall for filmmakers

Yonah Sadeh, Falls Village filmmaker and curator of David M. Hunt Library’s new VideoWall.

Robin Roraback

The David M. Hunt Library in Falls Village, known for promoting local artists with its ArtWall, is debuting a new feature showcasing filmmakers. The VideoWall will premiere Saturday, March 28, at 6 p.m. with a screening of two short films by Brooklyn-based documentary filmmaker and animator Imogen Pranger.

The VideoWall is the idea of Falls Village filmmaker Yonah Sadeh, who also serves as curator. “I would love the VideoWall to become a place that showcases the work of local filmmakers, and I hope that other creatives in the area will submit their work to be shown,” he said.

Keep ReadingShow less
film

A bowl full of stars

A bowl full of stars

A bowl full of stones.

Cheryl Heller

There’s a bowl in my studio where pieces of the planet reside. I bring them home from travels, picking them up not for their beauty or distinction but for their provenance. I choose the ones that speak to me — the ones next to pyramids, along hiking trails, on city sidewalks or volcanic slopes.

I like how stones feel in my hand: weighty, grounding. I don’t mind them making my pockets and suitcase heavier. The bowl is about the size of an average carry-on. It has been years since it was light enough for me to lift.

Keep ReadingShow less
writer's notebook

One-woman show brings Mumbet’s fight for freedom to Scoville Library

One-woman show brings Mumbet’s fight for freedom to Scoville Library
One-woman show brings Mumbet’s fight for freedom to Scoville Library
One-woman show brings Mumbet’s fight for freedom to Scoville Library

On March 29, writer, producer and director Tammy Denease will embody the life and story of Elizabeth Freeman, widely known as Mumbet, in two performances at the Scoville Library in Salisbury. Presented by Scoville Library and the Salisbury Association Historical Society, the performance is part of Salisbury READS, a community-wide engagement with literature and civic dialogue.

Mumbet was the first enslaved woman in Massachusetts to sue successfully for her freedom in 1781. Her victory helped lay the legal groundwork for the abolition of slavery in the state just two years later. In bringing Mumbet’s story to life, Denease does more than reenact history.

Keep ReadingShow less
performances
google preferred source

Want more of our stories on Google? Click here to make us a Preferred Source.