HOLMDEL – Testimony regarding an assisted living residence United Methodist Communities has proposed to build at 470 Red Hill Road, Holmdel, is expected to continue before the Holmdel Zoning Board of Adjustment on March 16.
United Methodist Communities, Neptune, is seeking a use variance from the zoning board and municipal approval to construct the facility which would serve up to 105 individuals who have dementia.
The Enclave at Holmdel would consist of a residential memory support program that will house a variety of programs and building design concepts including an assessment program; educational services; and community outreach and support, according to a description of the project municipal officials have provided.
The March 16 meeting will take place at 7 p.m. at the Holmdel municipal building.
Attorney Sanford Brown represents United Methodist Communities.
Testimony regarding the Enclave at Holmdel was most recently heard at the zoning board’s March 2 meeting, which was conducted in a virtual manner. No decision on the application was reached that evening and the public hearing was carried to March 16.
The property in Holmdel where the facility is proposed is in a residential zone at the border of Holmdel and Middletown, near an exit off the Garden State Parkway.
During the March 2 meeting, the project’s architect, Dave Hoglund, described the planned residences at the site and a building the applicant is calling a town center.
The town center has been reduced from a two-story building to a one-story building and has been shifted slightly to the north of its initial location. Shifting the town center has allowed the applicant to link two two-story residential buildings that are next to the town center, Hoglund said.
The town center is planned to contain administrative offices, a grocery store, a bistro, a kitchen, an auditorium/chapel, a concierge space and a lobby, according to plans for the building Hoglund shared with board members and members of the public.
Family members of the residents and visitors to the Enclave at Holmdel will enter the site through the town center.
Hoglund said the Enclave at Holmdel is planned to include 15 buildings, each of which will have seven private bedrooms, “much like a home you would live in,” he said, and provide living accommodations for up to 105 residents “who will be living at the site with a spectrum of dementia needs.”
According to Hoglund, buildings 1, 2 and 3 will be connected; buildings 4, 5, 6 and 7 will be connected; buildings 8, 9, 10 and 11 will be connected; buildings 12 and 13 will be connected; and buildings 14 and 15 will be connected.
Buildings 12, 13, 14 and 15 will each be two stories.
“The residential buildings are more than 200 feet away from any existing home. We think we have addressed all concerns. … We want the residents to be able to go outside, but not to be able to wander away. … Technology (to be employed by the facility) will monitor where residents are in the village,” Hoglund said.
The property where United Methodist Communities is proposing to construct the assisted living residence is known locally as Potter’s Farm.
William Potter, whose family has farmed in Holmdel for more than a century, spoke at the start of the meeting and provided the board members and members of the public with a history of the property.
