SLO County company drops assisted living services — displacing 29 seniors
A Christian senior living community in northern San Luis Obispo County is ending its assisted living services in June.
The assisted living component of Atascadero Christian Home, which does business as Atascadero Christian Community, currently serves 29 seniors and employs 40 staff members.
Assisted living services will be discontinued by June 20, according to a news release.
“I would really like to ask for you to stress the fact that we are fully engaged as a staff to place our most fragile residents on our campus in good situations when they leave here,” company CEO Gary Taylor said. “Our efforts are going to be 100% toward that.”
Residents receiving assisted living services from Atascadero Christian Community had occupied two buildings on campus.
The buildings, which the business rents from The Solomon Foundation, a Colorado-based Christian investment firm, will be vacant beginning June 20, Taylor said.
Atascadero Christian Community will continuing renting the buildings from the Solomon Foundation after the residents move out.
Taylor would not comment on any future plans the business has for those structures.
“I cannot elaborate at this point,” he said.
Assisted living services closed due to COVID-19
Envisioned by the family of Robert L. West as a retirement home for missionaries and pastors, Atascadero Christian Community incorporated in 1957 as a nonprofit organization and opened its doors in 1959, according to the company’s website.
However, the facility has struggled to stay afloat due to the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Despite pay raises, staffing levels at the facility have dwindled over the past few years, while the coronavirus pandemic increased costs for food, labor and insurance, according to the release.
“These facts made financial sustainability impossible,” the release said.
In March, the president of the ACC board of trustees sent a letter to the California Community Care Licensing Division (CCLD) informing the agency of the end of its assisted living services.
In the letter, the board of trustees wrote that ACC has “struggled unsuccessfully for several years to make (services) profitable,” according to the news release.
“The advent of COVID, along with increased operational costs, has made it even more difficult, and it has become clear to us that we cannot continue operations,” the release said.
Taylor said ACC will make “every effort” to ensure residents and their families affected by the ending of assisted living services have access to new homes.
It’s not clear what will happen to the ACC employees who work in assisted living services.
“We’re in grief around here,” Taylor said. “It is a sad day and we want to make sure that those people that are residents here that are going to be relocated are relocated well.”
The relocation process for assisted living residents officially started on Thursday, Taylor said.
While assisted living services at Atascadero Christian Community is ending, independent living, skilled nursing and memory care services remain intact, he said.
This story was originally published April 21, 2022 at 1:57 PM.
