A developer proposing a 162-unit assisted living facility on Mill Road would like to make his pitch to residents and neighbors during an informal community meeting at the Hotel Indigo February 10.
Ronald DeVito has been hoping to build the facility since 2010 on a piece of fallow farmland on Mill Road, but it requires moving the property out of the agricultural protection zone, which the town resisted when he submitted his first site plan in 2012.
He believes his new site plan addresses all of the concerns the town planning board expressed about the facility four years ago, including a reduction in the number of units and a rebalancing of independent living to assisted living units.
And now, DeVito wants to open a dialog with the community about his vision for the facility and the reasons why he thinks the town would benefit from it. The informal meeting will also allow residents to speak with him personally before the town’s public hearing on the zoning change, which is scheduled for February 17.
“I’d like to provide an opportunity for the community to hear about our plan and ask questions in an informal setting,” he said in an interview earlier this month.
The facility would create more than 200 local jobs during construction and another 112 full-time jobs at the facility itself by its third year of operation, he says.
DeVito argues that Riverhead Town’s burgeoning senior population has created a need for such a facility. As of 2015, almost 13,000 seniors were living in Riverhead, with more than 7,600 of those being older than 65 years old, according to one report that he cites in a memorandum to town board members.
“There is significant demand and unmet need for senior communities in the Town of Riverhead,” he wrote in the memorandum.
The proposed Concordia Senior Communities facility would offer a total of 48 independent and 114 assisted living units. They would be priced affordably, based on Riverhead’s median income instead of Suffolk County’s, according to the proposal, with all-inclusive rates that vary according to the level of care.
An adult day care would also be available for seniors who live at home but who are in need of supervision during the day, when a family caregiver may not be available. The day care service would include transportation to and from Concordia, as well as meals and recreational activities.
Temporary stays at the facility would also be available to give family members a break from the responsibilities of caregiving for their loved ones.
The community meeting will be held at the Hotel Indigo on February 10 at 7 p.m. DeVito said he mailed invitations to more than 250 households near the proposed facility.
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