Vintage Park facility notes 25 years of service to local elderly
Twenty-five years ago, a new 19-unit assisted-living facility opened in Holton that was known as “The Gran Villas of Holton.”
Through the years, the facility has seen various changes in size, ownership and leadership, as well as in name — it’s now known as Vintage Park — but the facility aims to maintain a high standard of service for its residents, said Jeremy Watkins, who has served as the facility’s executive director since August of 2020.
Those changes, according to Vintage Park’s lead certified medication aide, Barb Morfitt, a 24-year employee of the facility, include “quite a few directors.”
“And two additions since the original Gran Villas was built,” added wellness director Phyllis Twombly, a 16-year employee who has also served as its general manager in the past.
Medicalodges Inc. of Coffeyville sought to build an assisted-care facility in Holton in the mid-1990s, and in the fall of 1995, sought the Holton City Commission’s authorization of the issuance of $1,015,000 in revenue bonds for construction of the facility along Juniper Drive.
Commissioners authorized the bond issue, and not long after, construction began on the original $1.1-million, 19-unit facility, then known as The Gran Villas of Holton. That facility opened to the public in July of 1996, and by its second year, all 19 units were occupied.
That prompted Medicalodges to plan for an expansion of the Gran Villas facilities, and city commissioners approved another bond issue for a 12-unit expansion with an estimated price tag of $900,000. Ceremonial dirt was turned on the expansion in May of 2005, and the expansion opened at the end of 2005.
In addition to the 12 new units, bringing the total number of available rooms and suites for residents to 31, the expansion also included an in-house beauty shop and library near the facility’s east commons area.
The summer of 2008 brought a change of ownership, as Gran Villas was acquired by Vintage Park at Holton L.L.C. and within a year, plans for another 12-unit expansion were made public.
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