Renovations planned for Weinberg Terrace

A familiar setting is getting a facelift. Weinberg Terrace, a Squirrel Hill-based facility operated by the Jewish Association on Aging, will be updated with new living quarters and communal spaces, an expanded dining area, enhanced security and a modernized exterior.

The improvements, according to Mary Ann Foley, president and CEO of JAA, are part of an effort to “create the first and only urban senior village here in Squirrel Hill.”

Having recently renovated Waterside Landing, a personal care residence located in the former Charles Morris Nursing and Rehabilitation Center at Weinberg Village, the JAA is seeking to deliver similar amenities. Weinberg Terrace post-construction will enable couples to more easily relocate into the Bartlett Street property, she explained.

Get The Jewish Chronicle Weekly Edition by email and never miss our top stories Free Sign Up

“Today, it’s pretty tight quarters whenever somebody’s moving in as a couple at Weinberg Terrace,” she said. “We’re looking to create two-bedroom apartments with two baths, a larger one-bedroom with a den that can accommodate two people.”

While improved private living quarters are a boon, the “more exciting” developments consist of upcoming changes to communal spaces, she continued. “People move into personal care and they’re coming in because they need to be in a supervised setting, but that doesn’t mean they have to give up their lifestyle. It doesn’t mean that they have to give up the fact that they still have friends. And for many people coming in, it does mean creating new friendships.”

For too long, Weinberg Terrace has lacked “adequate spaces for individuals to congregate — so what we find is that people spend a lot more time in their apartment than [we] would like to see them spending in their apartment. We want to be able to have individuals coming out into comfortable spaces.”

To that end, an inner courtyard at Weinberg Terrace will be enclosed and a dining room will be opened to permit more “walkers and wheelchairs,” she said.

The hope, Foley continued, is that a renovated Weinberg Terrace connects the “Squirrel Hill area in a different way.”

Currently, the JAA maintains affordable housing units at The New Riverview Apartments. A memory care and secured assisted living space is available at AHAVA Memory Care. “We have Waterside Living, which is the new personal care facility that opened a year ago. And then we will have independent living, with a beautiful connector space, that will be able to connect all of these things,” she said. “It’s really truly an exciting time for us to be able to say that this is the direction and the future of aging in Squirrel Hill, and in Pittsburgh, for the Jewish Association on Aging.”

Foley explained that within each of the organization’s facilities, “wraparound services” are available. What this means, she said, is that — just like at the former Charles Morris Nursing and Rehabilitation Center — individuals can “receive home health services, which is skilled nursing care.” Individuals who are “considered homebound, but they have a skilled need for nursing, physical therapy, occupational therapy, speech, can also receive outpatient therapy, which is the rehab component that sits in our rehab satellite office [located at PT at the JCC, inside the Squirrel Hill Jewish Community Center].”

Additionally, outpatient therapists can “come over and do outpatient therapy in an  individual’s apartment or within the living space at any of our buildings. So, although the nursing home level of care doesn’t exist, what we have done is we have been able to deploy the wraparound services in each of our buildings to allow individuals to age in place with the services that they need.”

Updates to Weinberg Terrace remain in the “planning phase,” but a $20 million campaign is underway, Foley announced during a Sept. 2 annual meeting.

To date, more than $9 million has been raised; and while renovations will deliver enhanced eating spaces, there will be no changes to the JAA’s approach to kosher food, she told the Chronicle. The area of Weinberg Terrace where kosher food is “plated and served” will be redone and “kosher [meals] will continue to come out of the main area of the Charles Morris building because that’s where the main kitchen is, and that’s where we have the supervision of the Vaad.”

Ruth Katz, president and CEO of Association for Jewish Aging Services, attended the recent JAA annual meeting.

Katz praised the JAA’s quest to improve living conditions for residents.

“It really is about envisioning the future and envisioning a future that is not tonight or tomorrow or even Monday — it’s well into the future. It’s for generations to come,” she told the Chronicle.

Portions of the construction project will begin “within this fiscal year,” Foley said.

The renovations, she explained, are an example of JAA’s efforts to lead a changing approach to aging.

“We want individuals to see us as the future of aging,” Foley said. “Aging reimagined and the future of aging is where JAA is today.” PJC

Adam Reinherz can be reached at areinherz@pittsburghjewishchronicle.org.