When 83-year-old Betty Marriott moved out of her Douglas home into the Riverview Senior Living facility, she asked if she could bring her baby grand piano with her.
“I’ve been playing piano since I was 10,” she said. “I just love it. It’s my emotional release, you might say. You’re happy, you’re sad or whatever. It just comes out in your music.”
On a recent Monday afternoon, she played a cheery melody called “Snowbird,” a song she picked out to play during happy hour in the dining room. Marriott had lived at Riverview for about a month, and she was enjoying it so far.
“It’s brand new, so it’s very clean,” she said. “I like the people who work here. They’re all very friendly and helpful.”
Finding housing in Juneau is hard. It can be even harder for seniors who want to stay in Juneau but need a bit more care. Alaska’s population of older adults is growing rapidly, and in Southeast Alaska, nearly one in four adults are 60 or older, according to state data. As local seniors seek to age in place, Riverview provides a new place to do it.
A needed model
The facility is located in the Mendenhall Valley. It has 58 assisted living apartments and 29 memory care units, and they’re filling up fast: about 70% of apartments have been claimed by people intending to move in in the next three months.
“We expect to be 80% full in the next four to six months, if not 100% full,” said Carrie Pusich, Riverview’s community relations director. “The interest that we have gotten from the community has been overwhelming.”
The apartments have their own wheelchair-accessible bathrooms and kitchenettes with a refrigerator, microwave and sink. Riverview is an assisted living facility, meaning there are staff there to help with daily activities like taking medications, getting dressed or using the restroom. New residents are screened by a nurse to determine the level of care needed from the nurses, medical technicians and caregivers on staff.
Monthly rent starts at $6,000 for a studio and $7,500 for a one-bedroom apartment. That includes all meals cooked by the community’s chef and activities, like field trips to the Mendenhall Glacier and the Jensen-Olson Arboretum. Additional monthly care fees start at $650 and go up in $400 increments depending on the level of care required. Pusich said the prices are in keeping with the national average.
“I know it seems high to some people, but it’s not,” she said. “We want to make everybody comfortable. We want them to feel like their apartment is theirs.”
The first residents moved in in mid-May. Pusich said others are moving in in stages so the facility can hire staff as needed.
Years in the making
Riverview has key differences from other housing geared toward older adults in Juneau. Wildflower Court is a long-term care facility meant for people who need more extensive medical care. Trillium Landing and Fireweed Place are apartment communities. The state-run Pioneer Home offers its 49 residents multiple levels of care like Riverview does – with monthly rates starting at $3,458 including room and board – but it has a long waitlist.
That’s what inspired Pusich’s mom, Sioux Douglas, to try to bring another option to Juneau. She was president of the nonprofit Senior Citizens Support Services, Inc.
“Some people who needed assisted care, but weren’t on the Pioneer Home list or would have to wait way too long, found that the only thing they could do is move out of state or move up to Anchorage,” Douglas said. “We lost several good senior citizens who were longtime community members who had to go elsewhere for the care and the housing they needed.”
In 2012, the nonprofit held an open house at Nugget Mall to hear from Juneau residents about the need for assisted living in Juneau. Douglas said she talked to individuals who were “desperate” for assisted living options and families preparing to move out of state with aging grandparents.
“We already knew in our hearts that this was needed, but having that public forum convinced us to go forward,” she said.
The nonprofit spearheaded the search for a developer who could create an assisted living community in Juneau.
“That took several years,” Douglas said. “It took a lot of meetings with the city and with two or three developers. And when Torrey Pines Development decided to invest in Juneau, it was the answer to our dreams.”
A perfect partnership
Torrey Pines, a California-based developer, owns Riverview. It’s operated by North Star Senior Living, also based in California. The City and Borough of Juneau provided some incentives to help Torrey Pines see the project through, including property tax abatement and a lease structure that helped reduce upfront costs for the developer.
“I refer to this as the perfect kind of public-private project that communities should have,” Douglas said. “There’s an appropriate role for government – a small role – and it incentivizes private development.”
Juneau Assembly member Michelle Hale agrees. She’s the Assembly liaison to the Juneau Commission on Aging. She said the city’s work with Douglas’ nonprofit and Torrey Pines shows the city can make meaningful contributions to the housing market without constructing a city-run facility.
“The city does a huge amount in this community. We own our hospital, we own our docks and harbors, we own Eaglecrest, we own our airport,” she said. “I don’t think the answer is for the city to take on new roles, but rather to find those nonprofits and other entities to partner with to help make things work.”
Along with helping longtime Juneau residents stay in the community, Hale said more housing options for seniors could help open up the local real estate market. The number of people aged 65 and older living alone more than doubled from 2015 to 2020, according to the Juneau Economic Development Council.
“That’s actually one of the reasons pointed to for the housing shortage – where you might have had a family of four or five in a house, you might be down to just one person,” Hale said.
Helping Juneau residents stay in town as they age is important to Hale. She’s 61, and her mother lives with her and her partner. They’ve watched friends and neighbors leave Juneau as they get older.
“One of the things that has been the most heartbreaking for me over the years is having very dear friends who, once they retire, move south,” she said. “That always seems so sad to me – that we lose them in our community when they’ve been such a vital and vibrant part.”
Riverview represents a new part of Juneau’s community. As Betty Marriott performs on her baby grand for her friends and new neighbors, it’s clear she’s found her place in it.
