Senior living facility to break ground

Ageia Health Services, a local Central Oregon company, is set to break ground on a new senior living center at The McKenzie Meadows Village in Sisters this spring.

The planned facility is located along McKinney Butte Road in the vicinity of Sisters Middle School. It is not related to the recently approved 82-room assisted-living facility to be built on 7.2 acres of the "Carpenter property" just south of the post office, between Locust and Larch streets.

As part of the McKinney Butte project, the 46,000-square-foot Ageia Health Services facility will provide care levels up to and including memory care, with 45 private senior apartments and 20 memory-care apartments being built. Ageia has designs in place for future expansion of the living center, culminating in another 20 senior apartments, and eight memory-care apartments, totaling 93 private-residence rooms.

The future senior living center will have amenities including common areas, a library, indoor and outdoor dining facilities, courtyards, laundry facilities, walking paths, an Internet café, a TV lounge, beauty salon, and activity and game rooms. The senior living center is designed to be an integral part, and at the epicenter, of The McKenzie Meadows Village.

A 30-acre planned development, The McKenzie Meadows Village will be comprised of a community center, a park, senior cottages, low-income senior housing, senior apartments, and Deschutes County's School-Based Health Clinic.

Ageia Health Services, founded and run by president and CEO Kevin Cox, operates seven senior-living facilities across the Northwest, as well as a home care company. Ageia has built and managed successful senior-living facilities in numerous locations across the Northwest, ranging from Spokane and Bellingham, Washington, to Eugene, Lebanon, John Day and Bend.

In embarking on this new chapter, Ageia has partnered and aligned their vision with local developers of the McKinney Butte project, specifically property owners the Willits, Kallberg, and Reed families, all of whom are local Sisters residents.

"I'm excited to be a part of the McKinney Butte Project, which is really a vision that the Willitts, Kallberg, and Reed families have had for years," Cox said. "We are excited to note that this is not an exclusive community, so there will be affordable housing. It will be a beautiful place for seniors in Sisters to live through their retirement years."

Building of the senior living center is slated to begin May 2015, and will be the start of The McKenzie Meadows Village project.