BRATTLEBORO — The Brattleboro Retreat, the state’s largest psychiatric hospital, will lease the recently closed Holton Home, an assisted living facility, to serve as temporary housing for visiting doctors and nurses.
The stately Greek Revival stone building on Western Avenue, seen by drivers heading from Interstate 91 toward downtown, has been the most public face of the local older community since its opening as the Brattleboro Home for the Aged and Disabled in the 1890s.
But recent cost challenges and staffing shortages forced its owner, Garden Path Elder Living, to close the 35-room retirement home this past spring.
Enter M&S Development, a local firm best known for revitalizing Brattleboro’s Brooks House and Bennington’s Putnam Block. It has signed a 10-year agreement to manage the building, which the Retreat will lease for traveling workers who need housing for a minimum of three months.
“Our intention is to support the Retreat as it increases its staffing levels while helping Garden Path rebuild its finances to pre-pandemic levels,” M&S President Bob Stevens said in a joint statement. “Because Holton Home will cater specifically to traveling health care professionals, this will hopefully help the community by freeing up local apartments for long-term rentals.”
All involved are touting the plan as a win.
“This project allows us to get back on track regarding our finances,” said Garden Path Executive Director Bob Crego, whose nonprofit organization also operates the local Bradley House residential care facility.
The Retreat, for its part, has struggled to hire enough staff as it attempts to return to its pre-pandemic occupancy level of 100 inpatients by June 2023.
“Nothing is more painful across the board than hiring new workers, only to have the housing barrier prevent them from accepting the job,” Retreat Vice President Erik Rosenbauer said. “I see this project as a way for the Retreat to get back to full recovery and to more fully meet the needs of our community and the entire state of Vermont.”
A recent town study found the immediate need for at least 500 more local housing units, spurring another nonprofit, the Windham & Windsor Housing Trust, to hope to turn the building into apartments.
“It’s disappointing that the Housing Trust and Garden Path couldn’t come to an agreement on Holton Home,” said the trust’s executive director, Elizabeth Bridgewater. “But despite that, this project contributes to the community’s housing, and that is a good outcome.”