A new assisted-living facility for elderly residents is planned for Hilo along Highway 11 (Kanoelehua Avenue) at its intersection with East Kahaopea Street, where a greenhouse once existed.
A new assisted-living facility for elderly residents is planned for Hilo along Highway 11 (Kanoelehua Avenue) at its intersection with East Kahaopea Street, where a greenhouse once existed.
The 120-bed facility, to be known as Hilo Senior Housing, is expected to eventually employ 50 health care, maintenance, administrative, security, kitchen, dining room and housekeeping workers, according to a zoning change request submitted to the Windward Planning Commission.
The amendment request seeks a five-year time extension to allow for completion of drainage upgrades for a subdivision under construction. Those upgrades will be altered by the facility’s construction.
The developers want to make sure the assisted-living facility’s construction doesn’t delay progress on the subdivision and cause the subdivision to miss its deadlines, said project attorney Thomas Yeh.
The assisted-living developer, Rhodes Moore LLC Development Services(http://www.rhodesmoore.com/), based in Cardiff, Calif., specializes in infill projects at “difficult sites” and the creation of sustainable communities, according to its website.
The new facility’s plans place it in a FEMA-designated “special flood hazard area.” Thus, it must come into compliance with flood plain management requirements in the Hawaii County Code.
A letter of support for a project land-use permit, and any reasonably necessary amendments to current zoning ordinances, was submitted to the Windward Planning Commission by the Hawaii Island Chamber of Commerce. The chamber included as reasons for its support:
• A growing number of residents in need of such facilities in East Hawaii.
• The facility’s close planned proximity to shopping and services.
• Good economic use of a property unused for years.
• Additional job opportunities to “help sustain East Hawaii’s economy in a way that helps to alleviate a growing need.”
Bill Walter, chairman of the chamber’s government affairs committee, said not everyone coming to town asks for the chamber’s support. But the developers of this project did, and the chamber was glad to help once it reviewed the plans.
“The service that they propose to provide is really very much needed in this community,” Walter said. “Its location looks like a good, central location near other services convenient to the families that would have seniors in that facility.”
The facility is expected to include a mix of studios, one- and two-bedroom units, along with an Alzheimer’s/memory unit in a three-story building. Plans include community patios, courtyards and gardens. They also include “a small commercial center” that could house a business such as a dental office, medical clinic, offices or restaurant.
Yeh said planners hope to complete the project and open the facility within two to three years.
“We’re hoping that it really does serve a great need in East Hawaii,” he said. “We’re hoping to provide this service to the local population and at the same time provide jobs and employment and all the kinds of things that go along with that.”
A public hearing on a land-use permit for the assisted-living facility is scheduled with the Windward Planning Commission at 9 a.m. Jan. 5 in the county Aupuni Center Conference Room, 101 Pauahi St. in Hilo.
Email Jeff Hansel at jhansel@hawaiitribune-herald.com