Leadership of Deer Isle’s shuttered Island Nursing Home has adjusted plans to redevelop the building into affordable senior housing.
If the town approves its application, the nonprofit will now turn the 35-room, 70-bed building into 24 apartments, some for people 55 and older and others for members of the workforce who may earn too much for low-income housing but not enough to afford the island’s real estate market.
It’s the latest idea to repurpose the building since it closed in 2021 due to issues finding staff, which was largely attributed to the area’s high housing costs. The updated plans also better meet housing needs on the island, members said, particularly for young working residents who currently have few options.
A year after the nursing home closed, officials had hoped to reopen it as a residential care facility but found they would still be unable to raise enough money or hire enough staff. Directors were focused on affordable senior housing instead by late 2023 and said they have now found a flexible model is their only way forward.
Home Port Senior Living, formerly the Island Nursing Home, went before the town’s planning board Wednesday with a permit application for the roughly $400,000 project, which it intends to start with one apartment and one wing of the building. Changes would be made inside the building without affecting its footprint, they said.
Apartments would range from 600 to 750 square feet and are expected to cost non-senior tenants between $1,400 and $1,600 including most utilities. The possibility of offering some at market rate could offset costs; the board also projects a capital campaign and other fundraising projects to make rent affordable for senior tenants.
Board member Kathleen Billings said Home Port has run the numbers and is confident this flexible model will work. Changes in state subsidy programs and a study of on-island housing needs showed the change will best serve the community compared to all-senior offerings, she said.
Billings and Planning Board members said they hoped the proposal would play a role in providing more housing for the island’s workforce and younger residents, a need that has led a nonprofit to build 10 units in Deer Isle with plans for 12 more in Stonington, where some residents are also pushing for new mobile home parks in the face of a housing crisis that’s been called a “death spiral.”
Reopening as a nursing home is completely off the table, representatives said, and turning the building into housing of some kind is the board’s only option other than selling it.
The planning board found the application complete on Wednesday after initially tabling it in January. It plans to hold a public hearing on the proposal at its next meeting on April 16, followed by a vote to approve or deny the permit.
Interior work could start soon after an approval, representatives said. Remaining funds are limited, so they hope to have the building occupied soon.