Rockwood Manor Polls Seniors On Retirement Communities

Rockwood Manor is trying to find out what senior citizens think about retirement communities.

The 36-year-old South Hill retirement community mailed 4,000 surveys on Valentine’s Day to seniors living on the South Hill, in Medical Lake, Cheney and Airway Heights and elsewhere in the Spokane area.

“The survey is designed to ask people what types of services they would like to see in a retirement community,” said Steve Wuitschick, Rockwood’s chief executive officer.

Wuitschick said he expects between 15 and 35 percent of survey recipients to respond to the Feb. 14 mailing.

The survey asks people to rate the importance of retirement community amenities on a scale of one to five.

Sample questions include: “How important would it be to have a library room, computer center, whirlpool or chapel room available?”

In 1995 the U.S. Census Bureau reported that Spokane County is home to almost 65,000 people age 60 or older. That’s 16 percent of the county’s population, slightly above the statewide average.

There are more than 14 government-subsidized and 11 private senior housing communities on the South Hill. Many of those were developed in the past eight to 10 years.

Among the newest are the Waterford at 29th and Pittsburg and the remodeled Cooper-George at Fifth and Wall.

Developer Harry Green is proposing a 418-unit retirement community on Moran Prairie. Green is seeking a change in zoning that would allow for the complex to be built east of the South Hill ShopKo store, between Regal and Freya streets.

In a 1996 survey by the American Association of Retired Persons, 77 percent of people age 55 years and older said they would prefer to live in a mixed-age community when they retire.

Rockwood officials hope to learn more through their survey about the wants and needs of those interested in a seniors-only retirement living.

The survey is also designed to compare the needs of urban versus rural seniors, Wuitschick said.

“We’re trying to see how inner-city people versus those that live farther out might use retirement,” he said.

, DataTimes