South Austin facility set to open this summer
HAYS COUNTY — For years, local nonprofit AGE of Central Texas has worked to erase the stigma that aging is a negative, uncomfortable part of life.
AGE was founded in 1986 to be a “one-stop shop” for older adult services and resources. Now, the organization has expanded to support 3,000 Central Texas older adults as they “age in place” each year through educational programming, stimulating activities and community events — all with the mission to help these adults and their caregivers thrive.
AGE is the longest-operating licensed non-residential day activity and health service center in Central Texas, offering specialized care for adults living with dementia, memory loss or physical changes due to aging. The organization currently has facilities in Central Austin and Round Rock, which see 58 and 38 people per day, respectively.
A new facility is set to open in South Austin at the end of this summer with the capacity to see up to 75 adults a day — the organization's largest number — and marking an important location point for surrounding communities like Hays and Caldwell counties. According to Chief Development Officer Jayden Beatty, AGE has been working to expand to a third facility since 2017 after finding a critical need for their services in this area.
“The St. David's Foundation really helped lead that part of the conversation,” Beatty explained. “What they did was bring in city demographers and city leaders and identified this area as what they labeled as a ‘senior citizen desert,’ meaning there is no access or direct access to resources for older adults, which is causing a lot of older adults to go into crisis, especially due to lack of transportation options in the general area.”
“We did a survey to look at what are the reasons older adults are finding themselves in crisis; what are the things they’re most worried about [or] family caregivers?” she continued. “One of the results of that survey was that 41% don't know of a single resource they can call. One of our goals with outreach is to simply build awareness and use that as infrastructure to build participation in our services.”
AGE purchased the land in 2019 and officially broke ground in June 2022. Nearly a year later, the facility is almost ready to start seeing its first members. The 20,000-square-foot facility is being planned and built meticulously with its members in mind — many of whom have a cognitive illness like Alzheimer’s or dementia — by ensuring that everything is ADA-compliant and accessible. Beatty said that the staff even worked with landscapers to pick vegetation that is safe to eat and touch, just in case, helping to continue AGE’s culture of encouraging older adult autonomy.
“One of the purposes of the building is we’re creating ‘yes spaces.’ There’s never going to be a time where we have to say, ‘You can't go in there. You can't touch that. You can't do that,’” Beatty said. “You're going to see a lot of spaces that are designed to give choice. This isn't childcare. This is adult day health care. We want everyone who's served to feel [as] autonomous and independent as possible. We want them to be treated with dignity, which means that we offer them a choice. So no one's forced to do anything [but] we encourage and we try to design things that people will want to be a part of. But it's all about what works for them and what feels good to them.”
Beatty said that the goal is to avoid making the environment look or feel like a hospital. On the first floor, the facility is set to include:
• An Information Resource Center which provides educational resources for non-professional adult caregivers in the community, from weekly seminars (like fraud prevention and fall prevention) and workshops to support groups in order to address caregivers’ mental health and emotional challenges
• A room for AGE’s Health Equipment Lending Program, where free, gently-used medical equipment such as wheelchairs, walkers and shower chairs or health items like adult pull-ups can be donated to anyone who needs it
• A Social and Wellness Center with daily activities that stimulate cognition, physical activity and facilitate social connections — from art and musical performances to trivia, bingo and emotional support animals
• A sensory room with a touchscreen wall to soothe anxiety and provide cognitive stimulation
• A nap room and nurse’s suite for the on-site registered nurse
• An activity center and multipurpose room for book clubs and more
• A dining hall with dietitian-approved food for nutritionally-balanced meals, ideal for members who are low-income or food insecure
• The Thrive Center Garden, a gated outdoor space with flower beds, a vegetable garden, picnic tables and benches and a butterfly art installation called the Kaleidoscope Project
On the second floor, the facility is set to include:
• A computer lab, where adults can learn how to use their own technology and become educated on everything from telehealth and cybersecurity to learning how to FaceTime with family members
• AGE’s CaregiverU program, which provides education for non-professional caregivers
• AGE’s Memory Connections program, which provides support to adults experiencing mild or early-stage cognitive changes and helps them prepare for the future and live with the disease
• Below-market leasable office space for nonprofits
• A recording studio for nonprofits to utilize for podcasts or videography projects
“The purpose of this facility is to really help us expand beyond just this building. Our hope is that this building will be more accessible to areas like Hays County because it's off of I-35; it's physically closer,” Beatty said. “But, in addition to that, we want this facility to be a launching pad of deeper collaborations and partnerships in his county that are all geared towards helping the aging community.”
AGE already has close partnerships with local Hays County older adult organizations such as the Kyle Area Senior Zone and Buda Task Force on Aging. They’ve even collaborated with the Alzheimer’s Association to provide training to Hays County first responders on how to work with older adults with dementia.
AGE has a fleet of buses that offers a free transportation option for members within a certain radius. Beatty said that they are planning to add more routes prior to the South Austin facility launch and have been working with local transportation providers or nonprofits to figure out what that would look like for members coming to the facility from other areas, such as Hays County. Additionally, costs associated with the program are on a sliding scale and there are also contracts with Medicaid and the Veteran's Administration.
AGE’s success would not be possible without the support of the community. If you would like to contribute to the new facility, a match will be made by St. David’s Foundation. Contributions made within the next several weeks will also help AGE secure a $1.5 million gift from the Mabee Foundation. A variety of naming opportunities are also available. For more information and to donate, visit www.agethrivecampaign.org.
Like its other facilities, AGE’s South Austin facility, located at 9400 Alice Mae Lane in Austin, is set to provide daily care for older adults between 7:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. For more information, visit www.ageofcentraltx.org.
