Changes for senior housing in Canton, Evans Mills

Correction, 7/29/13: It’s come to our attention that we mischaracterized the nature of the new arrangement between Sparx Corporation and the Canton Housing Authority with respect to these buildings, as did the original article that’s linked in this post. I spoke with Kathy Race from Sparx this morning, and she clarified the situation: Of the 141 apartments in the two Canton Senior Living high rises, 25 are managed by the Enriched Housing Program. It’s those 25 apartments that Sparx will now be managing.

The Enriched Housing program at the Senior Living apartments comprises 25 apartments licensed with the New York State Department of Health to provide assisted living and health care. Corrections to this post are also made in the text below.

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Original post, 7/22/13:

A couple shifts this week in who’s running (and who owns) a couple senior housing complexes in our region.

The Canton senior housing complex on Riverside Drive in Canton. Photo: Canton Housing Authority

In St. Lawrence County, the Watertown Daily Times reports that Canton Senior Housing (a high rise building on Riverside Drive) will now be managed by Sparx Corporation, a for-profit subsidiary of United Helpers Corp. 25 apartments in Canton’s Senior Living High Rises that are currently managed by the Enriched Housing Program will now be managed by Sparx Corporation, a for-profit subsidiary of United Helpers Corp. (I was a little confused about how this whole “for profit subsidiary of a non-profit organization” thing worked — fortunately, the Times had my back on this one too.) Sparx is also the company that’s been working on the new “food hub” in Canton.

The Enriched Housing program manages apartments licensed with the Department of Health to provide assisted living and health care (more specific information in the link.)

The Canton Enriched Housing Program (part of the The Canton Housing Authority) manages the bulk of the complex, which has 141 apartments opened in 1983 (it’s owned by the Housing Authority), with the exception of the 25 apartments mentioned above. United Helpers runs the Maplewood Health Care and Rehabilitation Center in Canton. It’ll be interesting to see if residents see any changes under a for-profit, rather than a publicly-owned, model.

Meanwhile, in Jefferson County, the Watertown Daily Times reports that the property developer LeRay Housing Associates LP bought the Milltown Elderly Housing complex. That company also owns an off-post military housing complex across from Fort Drum.

Actually, the Milltown sale was recorded late last month. The 24-unit complex opened in 1989. We don’t know a lot more than this, but again, we’ll have to see what happens with this complex.

Tags: canton, elderly, evans mills, health care, housing, Jefferson county, senior, st lawrence county