Injured Pennsylvania veteran who qualifies for adaptive home can't find land that meets requirements

A severely injured veteran from Washington, Pennsylvania, qualified for an adaptive home, but his wife says he's still waiting after being turned away more than 10 times. Now the couple is asking for help, even hoping someone may be willing to donate land.

Staff Sergeant Gregory Foster was a Green Beret deployed to Afghanistan when he was injured in an ambush in 2011 and was awarded the Purple Heart and a Bronze Star with valor for bravery.

About six months later, back in the U.S., during a recreational jump, a blood clot from that injury triggered a stroke mid-air. Foster was unconscious on the way down and the chute partially redeployed, carrying him past the drop zone and into a tree. He was trapped there for over an hour. 

His family was told he wouldn't survive. Now he's living with a traumatic brain injury, he's blind in one eye and has limited mobility on the right side of his body.

"Think about being 39 years old and your whole world is ripped out from underneath you," said his wife, Colleen Foster. 

Gregory Foster relies on a wheelchair, but the home they're in now isn't built for it. He can't even get outside on his own. Yet he keeps going. He builds Legos, teaching himself to use his left hand, even completing a set with more than 90,000 pieces.

"It's therapeutic for him, not only for hand and eye coordination, but that's basically his life because he cannot get outdoors," Colleen Foster said. 

In 2024, Gregory Foster qualified for a specially adapted home through Tunnels to Towers — a home designed for veterans with severe injuries. It would be equipped with features that would allow him to move safely and live more independently day to day. But his wife says finding land that meets the requirements has turned into a heartbreak. They've been declined 11 times,  Colleen Foster said. 

"It gave him hope that he was going to have so much independence, and then it's like you dangle it in front of us and then you make it so difficult for us to get this home," Colleen Foster said. 

At one point, land was even offered, but they say it was rejected over a slope near the driveway. So now they're still searching and asking for help. They're hoping someone somewhere may be willing to donate land that qualifies so this veteran, who has given so much, can finally have a home that works for him. 

"I'm going to make it happen for him. If I have to work three or four jobs and if I have to build him a smart home, I'm going to," Colleen Foster said. 

KDKA reached out to Tunnels to Towers for a comment on Monday but did not hear back.