Low-income seniors will find a silver lining

Beth Slovic

Friday, Jan. 14, 2005 | 9:30 a.m.

When Blanche Garber retired in 1998 at the age of 75, she had worked in casinos for 23 years.

No longer working, Garber saw her income drop to $600 a month, the money she earned from Social Security. A long-time employee of the Mint hotel and then Circus Circus, Garber, at the age of 83, was no longer able to make ends meet in Las Vegas and was forced to move away from her family to Pahrump, where the cost of living was much lower.

Mariana Young, Garber's daughter who lives in Las Vegas, said her mother would like to return to Las Vegas to be closer to her. And Young would like her mother to live in an assisted living facility, she said.

But her mother's income, now about $1,000 a month in Social Security benefits, does not allow it. Assisted living facilities can cost as much as $3,000 a month, Bruce McAnnany of Nevada's Division for Aging Services said.

"She can't make it," Young said.

According to studies by AARP, the advocacy group for older Americans, Garber's situation is not unique in Nevada. In 2003, nearly 27 percent of seniors 75 and older in Nevada earned less than $15,000 a year.

Garber, who earns a lot less than that, hasn't been able to find affordable housing options in Las Vegas , her daughter said.

Responding to this lack of options, federal, state and local leaders combined efforts to create Silver Sky, an assisted living center for low-income seniors built on land donated to Las Vegas by the Bureau of Land Management.

Construction on the project doesn't officially begin until after today's groundbreaking ceremony, and it likely won't be completed until December. But many seniors, including Garber, are already eager to move in.

Their enthusiasm is shared by the parties responsible for the project's creation, the public-private partners who raised the money and gathered the expertise to undergo what they say is the first project of its kind in the nation.

Supporters of the project, including Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., Assemblywoman Barbara Buckley, D-Las Vegas, and officials from Harrah's Entertainment Inc., were to celebrate the facility's groundbreaking at the site, 8220 Silver Sky Drive, near Westcliff and Durango drives in western Las Vegas.

The project is unique because of where it's being built and who is responsible for building it. The BLM donated the land, the first time BLM land has been used for affordable assisted living.

Once completed, the assisted living center will have 90 units, including 84 one-bedroom apartments and six two-bedroom apartments. The complex will also have a recreation room, library, lounges, laundry facilities, landscaped grounds, courtyards, porches and a beauty parlor.

Additional organizers of the project include representatives of AARP Nevada, the state's Division for Aging Services, Fannie Mae and several nonprofit groups. This collaboration is part of what makes the project atypical.

Because so many different groups comprised the core planning committee, called the Nevada Model Assisted Living Advisory Committee, Silver Sky secured funding from several different sources, including private donors and federal and state coffers.

Harrah's has pledged $800,000 over a three-year period. Las Vegas passed $1 million in federal grants through to the program. The state chipped in $800,000 from a fund for affordable housing. And the IRS has given $750,000 in Low Income Housing Tax Credits.

To be eligible to live at Silver Sky, seniors can earn only up to $24,000 a year. That's due to federal guidelines that accompany some of the subsidies.

The cost of living at the facility is designed to be much less expensive than at other assisted living facilities in the state. But the exact price depends on a individual's income and on whether or not she is eligible for state-run waiver programs.

Barbara Buckley said the biggest problem facing seniors in Southern Nevada today is the lack of affordable housing.

And according to census projections, the problems appears to be on the brink of critical mass. A study of the census done in conjunction with the project's planning revealed that the population of 75-and-over residents is growing at an "astounding" rate, one high enough to assure the project's supporters that demand for the facility will only increase.

With demand probably on the rise, Buckley said she hoped the project could be replicated.

Gary Bermeosolo, the administrator for the Nevada State Veterans Home in Boulder City, shares Buckley's hope. Once it begins accepting residents, Silver Sky will complement the services offered at the veterans home, Bermeosolo said. The Boulder City facility serves only veterans and certain relatives of veterans requiring a high-level of personal care, he said.

"It takes the pressure off of us from the perspective that we have a lot of veterans who need assistance but do not qualify for skilled care," Bermeosolo said. "It means there's an alternative out there."

Blanche Garber's daughter said she and her mother have been waiting for such an alternative for years.