A group of Gig Harbor political and business leaders gathered last Wednesday at an office building off Canterwood Boulevard. They celebrated the official opening of the offices of Heron’s Key, a continuing-care retirement community.

The $180 million project will house about 300 residents in independent-living facilities and employ 125 to 150 full-time employees when it opens in late 2016 or early 2017, said Tom Stanfield, the marketing and sales director for Emerald Communities, the nonprofit organization that will operate Heron’s Key.

“It’s going to be huge,” Stanfield said. “We’ll be one of the largest employers in Gig Harbor.”
In addition to independent living, the community will contain 24 skilled nursing rooms and 12 assisted-living suites.

Continuing-care retirement living provides a transition between different phases of care, Stanfield said, meaning Heron’s Key residents can be transferred from independent living to skilled nursing to assisted living, or use memory care facilities, as it fits with their health needs.

The community will open with almost all residents in the independent-living units, and it will accommodate more residents in its skilled nursing and assisted-care facilities as its population ages.
Selling units at Heron’s Key is different than at other retirement communities.

“It’s not a real estate sale, and it’s not a timeshare,” Stanfield said. “It’s a contract that we’ll furnish for the rest of their life, on the same campus, as their needs change.”

The Heron’s Key campus will be at the Harbor Hill development, a master-planned community off Borgen Boulevard. Emerald Communities had been looking for the past eight years for a location to build its second retirement community after Emerald Heights in Redmond.

After officials looked at sites up and down the Interstate 5 corridor, the organization settled on Gig Harbor following market analyses and focus groups with seniors in Gig Harbor and Tacoma.

Stanfield said Emerald wanted to be sure the community would be served by a CCRC. Heron’s Key will be the first continuing-care facility in town.

Once the sale of the property at Harbor Hill had been negotiated, Emerald set about opening its office and beginning the process of priority registration, which will serve as a prelude to unit sales at Heron’s Key. The office is still in the stages of opening, and a large empty annex eventually will be converted into a mock unit. It will feature a bedroom, den and space to view different design options.

“We’re inviting interested seniors to reserve a priority reservation, so that when we have the complete architectural plan (for the facility), they can pick out their desired residence,” Stanfield said.

The community’s design plan, by the architectural firm Rice Fergus Miller, is expected to be finished sometime this fall.

Stanfield expects the priority registration period to take about a year, and that 45 households already have registered for spots at Heron’s Key. Applicants must be at least 62, able to live independently and able to afford the cost of a unit. After that process is complete, those who have registered will pay a 10 percent deposit on their unit.

Once 70 percent of the units have been sold with a deposit, the Emerald Communities board will approve the construction process to move forward. Construction is expected to take about 18 months to complete.

Because Heron’s Key will operate as a nonprofit, Stanfield said he hopes potential residents will see the facility as different from other retirement options.

“We can take any of the money we do earn and put it back into our community to benefit residents,” he said.