Current site or spot near Clay Township Park possible for costly new Portage Manor facility

SOUTH BEND — Fort Wayne consultants are studying two locations for potential construction of a new Portage Manor facility, but ultimately the multi-million-dollar decision about whether and where to build it rests with St. Joseph County officials.

One option is to build a new facility somewhere on 114 acres of county-owned land on which the residential health care center now sits. Tucked between Portage Avenue and the St. Joseph River just south of the Indiana Toll Road, Portage Manor was built in northwest South Bend over a century ago.

But a plan, proposed by MKM Architecture in March, for a new building at the site was deemed about $10 million too expensive. So county leaders paid the firm $25,000 this May to find ways to pare down construction costs.

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That directive led an MKM representative to another county-owned tract of land in northern South Bend: a site wedged in between Healthwin senior living facility and Clay Township Park.

The land is advantageous because it's flatter than the current Portage Manor acreage, according to Frank Fotia, the president of the Portage Manor Board of Managers.

"That would shave several million dollars off the project right there, because we wouldn’t have to level the land," Fotia said during a Thursday board meeting.

The county owns 35 acres of land, which Healthwin rents, south of the 45 acres that comprise Clay Township Park. The Board of Commissioners is set to enter an agreement to sell the park to the township for a nominal fee, however, so that township leaders have authority to build new facilities and manage maintenance.

Carl Baxmeyer, the president of the Board of Commissioners, said in a statement last week that the Fort Wayne consultants had a meeting with Healthwin officials to "gauge their interest in expanding their health care services to include assisted and independent housing" for Portage Manor residents.

But both Debra Lambert, the CEO of Byron Wellness Systems in Fort Wayne, whom the county pays to consult, and Anne Knouse, a Healthwin executive, said the mid-September meeting consisted mainly of a plan to share laundry services. There's been discussion of a shared-campus concept, they said, but nothing definitive.

“We literally walked the property just to see how it was laid out, getting ideas, what it looks like, the property size. That was essentially it," Knouse told The Tribune on Thursday. "They basically said they were looking at all options for Portage Manor. That about sums it up. It wasn’t a long meeting, maybe 45 minutes, because the property’s kind of big.”

Paying Healthwin to do Portage Manor residents' laundry at its facility could further lower the cost of a new building, Lambert said during a meeting Thursday. Baxmeyer also said last week that food service could be shared with Healthwin, but Lambert said that was likely impractical.

In a meeting last week, Clay Township residents worried how a new Portage Manor development nearby might affect the quality of their park, including a swath of trees separating it from Healthwin. The park boasts a riverfront trail, baseball fields and a frisbee golf course.

Dodd Kattman, the MKM consultant, said on Thursday that "any development there would be very well buffered by the dense wooded area" to preserve the privacy of parkgoers.

"I think there’s plenty of space that we should be able to tuck in a development to where it won’t be impactful to commuters," Kattman added, addressing concerns about traffic. The proposed site is at the intersection of Darden and Laurel roads, just east of the St. Joseph River.

Since December 2021, when the planning for construction and design of a new Portage Manor facility began, the county has paid at least $163,000 to MKM Architecture and Byron Wellness Systems.

At least $60,500 was paid to Byron for Lambert's work leading Portage Manor from early May to July 1. In the four months since then, the county has paid Byron $7,000 a month for Lambert's consulting and her guidance of the Manor's new leader. And $75,000 has been paid to MKM for Kattman's services.

MKM Architecture also designed Byron's health center in Fort Wayne, which is essentially a modern Portage Manor.

The lengthy deliberations about Portage Manor's fate have left the facility's residents uneasy, Lambert said of her visits with them. As of Thursday, 109 people — eligible residents are either under 65 with mental or physical disabilities or older than 65 — live at Portage Manor.

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There is no guarantee a new facility will be built, Lambert noted. Construction costs of $25-32 million will have to be approved by county leaders. But if there is a new development, Lambert said, it will be "to house all the current residents that Portage Manor serves, while also keeping in mind that there’s likely going to be future residents to be served, as well.”

In late September, Fotia said he hoped the County Council and Board of Commissioners decide whether to pay for new construction within six months — by the end of March.

His haste is due to Portage Manor's depleted cash reserves, which have fallen from more than $3 million to below $1 million over the past decade. The long-term goal is to replace an inadequate state revenue stream with a funding model that makes Portage Manor self-sustaining, not an annual drain on county resources.

“These processes do take a long time and uncertainty breeds rumors and does make people uncomfortable," Fotia said Thursday. "And I wish there was a way we could get through this faster.

"Unfortunately, there’s a process and we’re going through it, and as soon as we have any concrete information, that will be shared with the community, the residents and their families.”

MKM expects to finish its feasibility study by the of this year, Kattman said.

Email South Bend Tribune city reporter Jordan Smith at JTsmith@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter: @jordantsmith09

This article originally appeared on South Bend Tribune: New Portage Manor may go at current site or near Clay Township Park