For over sixty years, West View Healthy Living has served the ever-evolving needs of seniors in the Wooster community, expanding their services and broadening their reach over the course of their history. Most recently, West View added a skilled unit, independent living units, a wellness center, and an events center. Simonson Construction is proud to have partnered with West View to complete this project.
West View Healthy Living is a continuing care retirement community that offers independent living, assisted living, memory care, long-term care, and short-term skilled rehab services. The community began by offering residential care for assisted living. Over the years, West View added on new wings to their building to accommodate various needs. In the 1980s, West View added independent living units and nursing wings, and then in 2005 they completed Town Square, which is their biggest assisted living area.
Since it is centrally located in Wayne County, West View Healthy Living is able to serve the needs of many different people, and since they’ve been around for over 60 years, they have also had the privilege of serving multiple generations of people. There’s something special about being part of an extended family’s life for decades.
West View provides a community where people can age-in-place as their physical or financial needs change, without leaving the community they love. “We work really hard to work with residents and their continuing care,” Bonnie Hall, President of West View Healthy Living, said.
The campus’ array of services allows someone who begins in independent living the ability to move to assisted living and skilled nursing with relatively little disruption to their lives. Sometimes, individuals who begin in short-term skilled stays discover that being at home is harder than they thought. Since the community is equipped with both short-term skilled nursing and assisted living, those individuals can make an easy transition into assisted living.
As services, licensures, and needs in the community have changed over the years, West View has adapted and grown accordingly. The Town Square project in 2004 began to fill the gap in assisted living facilities in the area. The latest addition of a wellness center is an answer to the area’s need for gym and fitness facilities for individuals 55 and older. The wellness center is open to anyone in the community as well as those who live at West View, and a partnership has been established between the wellness center and the local YMCA. The event center is also open to the public in addition to meeting the needs of West View residents.
“Our chapel was becoming the everything space instead of serving just as the chapel,” Hall shared. “The event center gives us the opportunity to have a different space for meeting and a new space open to the community as well.”
The event center is used regularly by residents for birthdays, baby showers, and memorial services, and locals from around Wayne County also take advantage of the events center. This community connection extends beyond facilities, too. West View strives to be an educator in the community, hosting educational opportunities in the event center. They also partner with area businesses to hold corporate meetings, hiring events, and parties.
Simonson had the pleasure of dreaming with and designing the spaces that are being utilized by the Wooster community and West View residents daily.
“We were very pleased with our partnership with Simonson,” Hall said. “They brought the ability to build a great product and came in with design ideas and suggestions for how we could do things differently.”
“I can’t say enough about the crew from Simonson. They did what they said they were going to do.”
Even when there were bumps in the road, “We got together and figured it out. If a design idea didn’t seem like we envisioned it, they were great at partnering with us and recrafting the project to make it have the best outcome.”
Hall shared that the design and build of this nature was a really big undertaking for the West View team. “Had we not partnered with an organization like Simonson, I’m not sure we would have been as comfortable moving forward with this size of a project. Our board had a vision, but Simonson helped us bring that vision to life,” said Hall.
“We’re not builders and architects, we run healthcare facilities,” Hall said. Since the healthcare industry is very regulated, West View needed a builder that understood all of the required regulations and could anticipate their needs. “Simonson had really great knowledge of all of that.”
Even beyond the completion of the project, the West View board has been pleased with Simonson’s work. “They’ve helped with things that have happened after the project and have been very responsive after the fact,” said Hall.
West View Healthy Living is making a dramatic difference in the lives of seniors in Wayne County. All of us at Simonson are proud to have partnered with their team to serve this population. Do you have a dream for a building project? Start planning with us today.
