If you build a nursing home for 226 residents, but only 60 beds are approved, what do you do with the extra space?
Simple: Get creative and redevelop your building into a multi-purpose facility that can be used by a variety of people. At least, if you're a certain group in southwestern Wisconsin, that's how you show the rest of the country what you can do.
Kelly Kramer, administrator of Hillview Healthcare Center in La Crosse, Wisconsin, is currently working on a $19.6 million renovation of the 85,000-square-foot facility to create more comfortable living areas for residents. , a multigenerational childcare center, and 10 facilities are planned. The unit complements the city's Pathways Home program, which helps homeless people.
The bulk of the renovation funding ($12 million) comes from the pandemic-inspired American Rescue Plan Act, with an additional $1 million coming from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development's Community Projects Funding Grant, which was funded by U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin. It was secured by a member of the Democratic Party of Japan. -WI). The rest of the renovation funding will come from a bond package and no property tax increases will be made, Kramer said.
“The state is pushing hard to make nursing homes more home-like, less institutional, less hospital-like,” she told McKnight's Long Term Care News Friday. “We had a huge building that we wanted to tear down and build new, but the post-COVID economy was terrible. We thought, 'What else can we do?' .”
The 44-year-old Hillview is a county-operated facility that allows for extensive collaboration between municipal departments, including aging, disability and human resources.
“We came together to identify where the gaps were in our community,” Kramer said. “What are the unmet needs? And we looked at whether we could use the Hillview space to support those gaps.”
Officials broke ground on the resulting renovation and expansion last week.
Mr. Kramer was quick to acknowledge that 10 short-term accommodation units provided to individuals experiencing homelessness would not solve the entire problem. But she says it will make a difference for people who can stay for one to three years.
Once the renovations are complete, there will be no access between the supported housing area and the nursing home. There is also a separate area in the parking lot.
Another nursing home space will be converted into a multigenerational day care operated by an existing licensed day care provider. The facility will accommodate infants and older children, Kramer said. He added that if the facility were to receive state approval, it could also accommodate adults with mild to moderate dementia at the other end of the age spectrum.
“State regulation is difficult,” Kramer points out. “They want to separate adults and children. There's a lot of things that can go wrong, but we're working with the state. There are a lot of benefits to bringing them together.”
Another benefit is that by providing childcare services in spaces shared with nursing homes, you can help nursing homes with staff in need. Multigenerational daycares are almost unprecedented, and Kramer said he's only found one model facility in New York.
“This could help solve the staffing crisis facing nursing homes,” Kramer added.
