Travis County Commissioners Court
November 10, 2009,
Travis County Health Facilities Development Corporation
>> we will call to order the Travis County Health Facilities Development Corporation.
>> two items this afternoon, number one consider and take appropriate action on request to approve payments to Travis County for accounting and administrative services.
mr.
davis?
>> getting geared up for item no.
2.
this is the annual payment that the corporations have to make to Travis County for the services that the county provides, including employees.
and the amount, based on the formula that we have done for years, which is what the ending fund balance is and that's proportioned among four corporations.
and the amount for the health facilities corporation that I'm asking you to approve is $51,285.55.
>> questions?
>> move approval.
>> second.
>> discussion?
all in favor?
that passes by unanimous vote.
item no.
2 -- now that mr.
davis is geared up -- is to consider and take appropriate action on request to approve an invoice from lockart, -- approving an agreement to issue bonds and other matters related thereto concerning a request to issue bonds to finance the expansion of west minster manor a life care retirement community.
>> good afternoon, board members.
i'm here with cliff blunt on the far end our attorney and mr.
kevin reed, who is attorney for the -- for the westminster manor facilities with three of their board members, david quintanilla, chair of the board, tom granger and Margaret gosling.
i think cliff will start.
he has one correction to make with the backup.
>> okay.
>> in the agreement to issue bonds the old form was used initially that had the old
>> [indiscernible] in it, so it has been revised, I have those copies here to ploy -- to provide that the fee will be as provided in our policy guidelines.
the issuer fee.
i just wanted to clarify that, what's in your backup, that paragraph 9 needs to -- has been changed.
>> so did the fee go up or down.
>> went down substantially.
>> we ought to be sad, huh?
>> yes, sir, that was a change that was made several years ago.
>> thank you.
>> [laughter]
>> and mr.
reed will give you a short presentation on the project that they are interested in.
>> first of all, we appreciate the opportunity to spend a few minutes with you this afternoon and tell you a little bit about this project and we are happy to answer any questions that you might have.
i have provided a packet of information for all of you at your desks.
what you might do, there's a piece in there that has two parts, a site plan, it's the one that's paper clipped in the front that I pulled out a little bit for you.
you might pull that out.
to give you a little bit of history, west minster manor has operated in Austin for about 40 years, continuing care life community certified by the Texas department of insurance.
we are a non-profit organization with a community board of directors, we have an 11 member board, three of whom are here today.
mr.
quintanilla our chair, mr.
granger the head of the finance committee, ms.
gosling is the head of our expansion committee.
we have in the past confined this to approximately three previous projects here with the health facilities development corporation, very successfully, I might add and we look forward to working with you on this project.
the current project that's proposed is approximately $100 million.
it will be done in two phases, approximately $40 million would be bank qualified debt that we help to close by the end of the year.
another 60 to $70 million will be tax exempt bonds that we would hope to close by February.
all of that will help result in a major expansion at west minster manor.
if you have a copy of the site plan there I might point out to you you will see mopac across the top of the site plan.
the facility as you may be familiar with is directly across from camp mabry on mopac.
to the north of the facility there is a new multi-story apartment complex, a little down you may have seen that be constructed along mopac over the last year or so.
our new construction will be just to the south of that new apartment complex and right adjacent to our existing six story building.
it will consist of 75 new independent living units, 25 member units, 44 new skilled beds and 24 assisted living units.
we're going to actually build that in two phases in order to make it work with our new structure.
it will involve some new construction and some tear down but a major expansion to what we have there and really allow west minster manor to continue to provide the service it has the last 40 years.
we would be happy to answer questions about the project or the manor itself.
>> questions?
>> I do have a couple of things that I would like for you to speak on.
could you speak to the pricing structure and the availability of west minster services to those of limited means.
>> I appreciate that question.
west minster as you may know is a facility based on the pricing structure that -- that I would say serves upper middle income and higher population, but at the same time we have a number of people who live in the manor over a long period of time.
one of the things that has a tendency to happen as people live in the manor, we have people who have lived more than 20 years there.
under those circumstances, they often will spend down their resources, the manor in the course of its 40 year history has never put a person out is the best way to say that.
we have an extensive hardship policy.
under that policy we continue to keep people regardless of their financial ability after they've been admitted to the manor.
>> could I add to that a little bit?
there's a wide diversity of economic status in west minster manor it goes from retired teachers, high school teachers, I'm thinking of one right all the way up there some of the real leaders of our business community here as they've reached retirement age.
so there are different sized apartments and different just a wide, wide range.
so that we have the ability for someone to live in west minster on -- on less than $2,000 a month, and then we have -- they will be in a very small amount, all the way up to much larger apartments where a larger monthly fee is charged.
so there's a lot of retired university people that go from the home ec department to engineering and law schools are there.
i think if you have ever been over there that I'm sure that you will recognize many of the people who there are because they have -- I think they are unified in having spent lives often of great community service.
on various different levels.
>> can you also speak to the relationship of the board members to the organization, do any of the board members have any financial stake in the endeavor.
>> no, none of the board members have a financial stake in the endeavor.
the board again, it's a non-profit organization.
we have a conflict policy that the board strictly adheres to.
and -- and --
>> I guess I didn't add the board is all volunteer, too, none of the board members are paid for their service.
>> > if a person was interested in maybe occupying one of these units, how would they go about that?
again, I'm not too clear to the rate structure as far as to show diversity -- diverse economic diversity, how -- how is that range from?
what low end, I guess there's a high end somewhere, but there's a low end, also.
so what's the low end as far as a person being able to occupy units and then how are they able to get involved in actually becoming an occupant of the units?
can someone help me on that?
>> I could try to answer that for you, Commissioner Davis.
the -- the manor has -- when people originally applied to the manor, the manor has a number of qualification questions that they ask people.
part of that is a financial qualification too be sure that -- to be sure that they are going to be able to financially sustain themselves over their stay in the manor.
in addition, there are some health care questions.
one of the big parts of the manor is that it's called a life care retirement community, so as part of that you also have a nursing -- in fact nursing home services available to you over the life of your stay.
and so there's some health question that's are asked to assure that again you are going to be appropriate for entry.
one of the things that they are looking for in that is just so make sure that people are placed correctly.
so if it's someone who may be in more need of assistive living services or nursing home services, they could be guided more to that kind of facility as opposed to the manor, the main really focuses on people who are at least initially able to live independently.
those are the people who are approached.
there is a financial qualification for entry and as I said, as ms.
gosling said, on the lower end of that you would have smaller apartments.
we have efficiency apartments that are smaller and smaller on the price range and we will be happy to give you a -- the price schedule.
there may be one in the packet.
if there's not we will be happy to give you one.
>> okay.
i would be interested in seeing it.
i guess as you go through your -- this process, at some time and stage of it, how would the community really know about you, per se.
i know that you are well established, I'm not knocking that, but everybody may not know who you are.
and what you are about.
and I think this is a pretty good disclosure today.
however, for those new persons that are just now hearing about this, how would they know as far as getting additional information from ya, on some of the concerns.
like you say you have a qualification, questionnaire, all of these other kind of things, how would they actually get locked in and connected and hold on to you to make sure that if it's something they may like to investigate later.
>> the manor has a very extensive marketing office.
we have a website.
people can either check out on the website, they can telephone the manor and speak with one of the marketing people at the manor, come in and speak with people in person at the manor.
we have recently been doing more advertising as we have been gearing up to this project.
to be honest, the manor hasn't done a great deal of outside advertising because frankly they haven't needed to, with this project they will do that and this will make us much more visible in the community certainly.
>> all right.
that was my final question.
>> for the record, some of us have had an opportunity to visit with you regarding this.
any other questions?
so what --
>> I'm sorry, one other thing.
i did just want to say we have had the opportunity visit with judge Biscoe and Commissioner Eckhardt because we actually are in her precinct.
we would like to extend an invitation to the rest of you if you would like to come out to the manor, we would love to have you.
in fact we will make a call this week to your office and double check with you.
we would love to have it out, show you around, let you know what our facilities are out there.
>> it's been a while since I've been out there.
i used to visit old friends there
>> [laughter] so I probably need to go out there again.
>> this new project has design theories that are coming about over the last, you know, 10 or 15 years, trying to do a seamless, seamless process of going from independent living, apartment house or condo living to where you need some help but you are still in the same environment, you know all the way to where you do need skilled nursing facilities, it should all flow seamless so you don't feel like you are going into a different setting.
you know, my dad's 89 years old, I cannot convince him to go to a facility.
because he thinks a facility like this is a nursing home.
the old style, you know, very sterile and concepts now are coming around where we're trying to make, you know, certain for us baby boomers, I know some of you all are young but some of us aren't, what's going to happen for this market in the future.
i think project is an excellent project that's going to allow us to see how this new design concept work.
so we are really pleased with the project, the design and we're really excited about trying to get the project going.
>> so, cliff, what are we asked to do today?
>> this is a preliminary resolution, kind of referred to as inducement resolution to be adopted.
it approves holding a public hearing, which they've asked to be set on December 8th, approves filing a notice of intention to issue bonds, which is something the corporation is required under health facilities development act to file with the county clerk's office.
and approves the agreement to issue bonds.
we are not obligating the corporation at this point to actually issue the bonds.
everything is subject to the review of your financial advisor, lad patillo and our legal review and the board being comfortable with the project at that time.
again, as kevin said probably at least in two series.
one in December for a qualifying issue and then a bond issue in the first quarter of 2010.
so there are further approvals that will need to come from the corporation board and will be back before you most -- if this is approved on December 8th most likely for approval as well as the public hearing.
>> and I'm sorry that I neglected to mention this, if anyone else mentions to you all our preference for having public hearings here?
>> we are planning on having it here.
we're not going to have that problem we've recently had.
>> whether we approve the taking on the preliminary steps as -- move that we approve the taking of the preliminary steps as set forth in the agenda item and set forth by cliff blunt.
>> second.
>> discussion?
all in favor?
that passes by unanimous vote.
good luck to you, happy to say we've done business with you before so we have high expectations.
>> thank you very much.
>> thank you.
>> okay.
>> thank you.
>> thank you.
>> move adjourn.
>> all in favor?
that carries unanimously.
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Last Modified:
Tuesday, November 10, 2009 1:40 PM
