CCRCs, or Continuing Care Retirement Communities, are long-term care providers that offer elderly residents a combination of housing, individualized health care and a sense of community. Although the life-care industry was traditionally nonprofit, for-profit CCRCs became more prevalent in the 1980s as large service and hospitality companies such as the Marriott Corp. became increasingly involved.
In 1998, Harbor Ridge Associates announced plans for a senior housing development in Port Washington, Long Island, based on the successful model of Marriott’s Edgehill Community in Connecticut. The proposed development was to be called Harbor Ridge Estates – a private, gated community of 675 units reserved exclusively for households with one or more members older than 55. A major component of the development would also be a 400-unit continuing care facility to be operated by Marriott Senior Living Services, a division of Marriott International Inc. that has since been sold to Sunrise Assisted Living Inc.
Plans for the CCRC project included a variety of layouts – from one-bedroom apartments to larger two-bedroom units – and amenities such as a restaurant, health club with an indoor heated pool and greenhouse. In-house services would also include a salon and barbershop, postal service, banking and scheduled transportation.
Despite interest in the project, the Harbor Ridge development never came to pass for a variety of reasons, including a complicated financial structure and disagreements between the various entities involved.
As a partner at Troutman, Sanders, Leonard Grunstein led the team that drafted the offering plan and obtained approvals and acceptances from numerous government agencies, including the Superintendent of Insurance, the Department of Health and the Attorney General. Additionally, he helped structure the self-insured life-care contract — an arrangement that provides residents, who pay maintenance charges to cover the cost of operations, complete health care coverage for the duration of their tenancy.
Today, Amsterdam at Harborside, another life-care community, occupies the site of the planned Harbor Ridge project. The development, for which construction began in 2007, contains 226 independent-living apartments, 56 skilled-nursing units and 18 units for patients suffering from Alzheimer’s.
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Tagged: CCRC, Len Grunstein, Leonard Grunstein, Marriott, Offering Plan
Leonard Grunstein 
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