Tahanang Walang Hagdanan was founded by Sr. Ma. Paula Valeriana Baerts, ICM, a Belgian nun who belonged to the Missionary Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. In 1965, she was sent in the Philippines and assigned in the Philippine Orthopedic Center. During her service in the hospital, she saw the miserable plight of persons with disability that brought about her eagerness to improve their lives. Later did she realize that it was her real mission in life.
Sr. Valeriana was touched by the pathetic lives of the severely disabled who are mostly abandoned by their kins in the National Orthopedic Hospital. With the help of the civic minded citizens, she started putting up sheltered workshops patterned after the Cheshire Homes of the United Kingdom. In a span of five years, ten half-way homes have been established; Sinagtala for Boys the first to be built in 1965 second was the Sinagtala for Girls and in 1968, the Bahay Kakayahan was built, later on many workshops were established by the organization.
In 1972, Sr. Valeriana attended the World Rehabilitation Congress in Sydney where she met Mr. Lionel Watts, the founder of the House with No Steps in Australia, which is a vocational training for persons with disability in Sidney, Australia. She encouraged Mr. Watts to visit the Philippines.
Project proposals were sent to different funding agencies and finally the Belgian Government heeded the call for the center. It funded 75% of the building construction. The archdiocese of Manila allowed the lease of 4. 2 hectare lot in Cainta and in February 21, 1973. Tahanang Walang Hagdanan, Inc. was established.
