Trussville City Council hears concepts for new senior living community

Rendering of the proposed development courtesy of the Cottages.

The Trussville City Council held its regular council meeting on Tuesday night beginning with a presentation by Cliff White, the president of the Cottages assisted living community, who shared concepts for a $43.5 million planned unit development (PUD).

White, who first announced the project four years ago, said the plan would require $3.4 from the city to move forward.

The Trussville PUD parcel approved by the Council in 2015, found in Trussville’s Planning and Zoning Ordinance, Section 21.0 PUD Planned Unit Development District, was designed to permit development of “comprehensively planned projects which permit one or more uses to be developed on a tract of land.”

In addition, the ordinance expresses the intent of PUD, which “promotes community development through residential (single-family, attached family, and multi-family dwellings), office or industrial parks, commercial, and service centers.”

Headquartered in Huntsville, Cottage Senior Living maintains 10 Cottage locations throughout the Southeast, including Alabama, Mississippi, and Tennessee.

White provided the Council with an overview of a three-phase project that will occur over the next 10 years. White expressed his hopes that completion of Phase 1 will enable the development of 20-plus acres of additional undeveloped land along Pinchgut Creek.

Phase 1, also known as the Creekside neighborhood located off Creekside/Kenimer Avenue, will consist of an age-restricted community for adults aged 55+. This senior community will house a 25,000-square-foot assisted living building broken into two segments to include 16 units of memory care residences and 24 units of regular assisted living. The back of the property will house senior apartments.

“We are trying to bring a state-of-the-art, Class A, totally unique senior housing project for downtown Trussville,” said White. “We want to bring the unity of Trussville into our senior housing project, creating an opportunity for people of all ages to interact in downtown within walking distance to Quadrant One actively engaging in the downtown redevelopment.

“Through the exercise we have recognized that our parcels are not really what we are trying to accomplish here. At the end of the day, we are trying to create a space. We cannot do this without your help and cannot do this without walkable access to the incredible plan that you have in Quadrant One.”

White asked the council for a quarter-mile of paved greenway connecting the senior housing project to Quadrant One. He said that the investment of $3.4 million is required by the City of Trussville to mitigate the impacts of “substandard secondary streets” and “flood risk of Pinchgut Creek”.

“From a space planning perspective, there is approximately 40,000 square feet of those two pieces on that parcel,” he said. “But dependent entirely on the access provided by the extension of Kenimer and right in and right out. This right of way has been permitted by ALDOT as well as the Kenimer Road extension.”

“We have spent about $3 million in pursuit of this project,” said White. “We have already applied for Segway permits and our assisted living designs are with the Alabama Department of Public Health for their review. The independent living is in its final cleanup process and essentially ready for permitting also.”

White told the council that the project will not come into fruition without the city’s help. “The project will not continue without some solid written support,” he said. “Our equity investors are anxious about solidifying this plan that we have created together with Trussville.”

White added that the total contributions to the city are $3.4 million over a three-year period which the city would see an 6-percent return over a 10-year period. This return is from 4-percent sales and roughly 55-percent property tax collected.

He said the city would see an 8-percent return is phases 2 and 3 are completed, but White does not own the property for those phases.

In other matters, the Council approved:

• Minutes from both June 8 special meeting and June 12;
• Agenda and Consent agenda;
• Proclamation 2018-014 Wreaths Across America Dec. 15, 2018;
• Resolution 2018-018 bid award on Metro Ethernet;
• Merit increases effective July 7 for 2 Trussville Fire Department employees, one IT employee and Dispatch employee;
• Hiring of John Jerard Baker for Parks and Rec Baseball Athletic Director;
• Hiring of Patrick Gorden for Trussville Police Department;
• Promotion of both Phillip Keith McLaughlin and Jeff Fore to Assistant Fire Chief;
• Merit increases for two, Dalton King and Stephen Nabors, who graduated from Fire College;
• Payroll correction for Parks and Rec Larry Zeitvogel;
• Resignation of police administration clerk, Tiffany Jackson;
• Accounts payable; Training classes including Voice Stress Analyst for PD Lovell, NASRO for PD Bates, Alabama ASCE/APWA for public works Sullivan, Search Warrant Major Case Investigation for McCool; and Glock Armorer Course for Findley.