Mountainside Wins Best Practice Award

July 09, 2010

Press Contact:         

Elyse Thierry

(434) 817-5236

ethierry@jabacares.org

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

 MOUNTAINSIDE WINS BEST PRACTICE AWARD

Commonwealth Council on Aging recognizes Crozet assisted living facility as model for “doing right while doing well”.

Charlottesville, VA—- JABA is pleased to announce that its Mountainside Senior Living assisted living facility in Crozet, VA was chosen as a Commonwealth Council on Aging’s $1,000 Award Winner of the 2010 Best Practice Awards program. Mountainside Assisted Living was selected following a rigorous review process from a field of 35 applications from across the Commonwealth of Virginia.

The Commonwealth Council on Aging Best Practices Awards are designed to identify and recognize unique programs serving older Virginians and their caregivers, and to encourage the replication of model programs across the Commonwealth. Programs are judged for their innovation, cost-effectiveness, sustainability, ease of replication, and their impact on the quality of life of older adults, their families and caregivers.

The Best Practices Award lauds Mountainside for balancing “a mixture of private-pay, and Auxiliary Grant (AG) or Medicaid-supported beds.” Private-pay beds help to offset some of the shortfall in revenue from Medicaid. The award statement goes on to say “JABA’s Mountainside Senior Living is indeed an exercise in doing right while doing well.”

When asked to comment on the award, Dr. Richard Lindsay, member of JABA’s Board of Directors and Chairman of Long-Range Planning Committee stated, “When JABA stepped in to rescue what was then Windham, the urgent need was to ensure that the 143 individuals living there would not be out on the street. As Mountainside’s transformation evolved and the Crozet community embraced the facility and its residents, Mountainside became much more. Today it is a model for how to change the way people think about assisted living and the integration of a facility like Mountainside into the community that surrounds it. This is in no small part due to the superb job that Mountainside’s Administrator June King and her staff have done to make it a real home for the residents, and to ensure their participation in the community of Crozet.  We anticipate that other communities will want to replicate JABA’s truly innovative model.”

Other accolades for Mountainside Senior Living include the 2007 Governor’s Housing Award.

For more on the Commonwealth Council on Aging and the 2010 best Practices Awards Program, please see http://www.vda.virginia.gov/council.asp.

For more on Mountainside Senior Living, and JABA and its services, please see www.jabacares.org.

About JABA

JABA (the Jefferson Area Board for Aging) serves the city of Charlottesville, and the counties of Albemarle, Fluvanna, Greene, Louisa and Nelson. JABA cares about all aspects of senior and intergenerational welfare.  The nonprofit organization works to promote, establish and preserve sustainable communities for healthy aging that benefit individuals and families of all ages.

For information on JABA and answers to other aging related questions, contact JABA at (434) 817-5222 or visit the Web site www.jabacares.org.

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[Photo Caption]

[Left to Right] (June 14, 2010)—- JABA’s CEO Gordon Walker and JABA Board Members: Dr. Richard Lindsay and Joseph (Rick) W. Richmond, Jr., Esq. (holding award) accepted the Commonwealth Council on Aging’s $1,000 Best Practice Award 2010 for Mountainside Senior Living.