Member News

April 14, 2020

ASHA and Argentum jointly respond to an article that appeared in The Wall Street Journal on Saturday, April 10, with the headline, Coronavirus Strikes at Least 2,100 Senior Facilities Across U.S., Killing 2,300 People. Please click here to view the letter.

April 8, 2020

ASHA and Argentum, in concert with Arena and OnShift, have launched Senior Living FastMatch to help pair the displaced workers from the hospitality and restaurant sectors with job openings in the senior living profession.

To learn more about this resource, please click here

April 6, 2020

ASHA’s written response to the article that appeared in the April 5, 2020 edition of The Wall Street Journal can be viewed by clicking here.

March 25, 2020

ASHA and Argentum held a second COVID-19 Webinar on March 25. The slide deck from the Webinar can be viewed by clicking here, while the recording of the Webinar can be accessed in the Members Area of the ASHA website in the COVID-19 Resources tab. Today’s Webinar featured: JoAnne Carlin of Willis Towers Watson, Susan Coppola of Sunrise Senior Living, Paul Gordon of Hanson Bridgett, and Lynne Katzmann, Ph. D of Juniper Communities.

March 22, 2020

CDC has released new guidance for retirement communities and senior living to better aid in the planning, preparation for, and response to COVID-19. The guidance is based on what is currently known about the transmission and severity of the coronavirus disease.

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March 19, 2020

ASHA requests immediate financial relief in the Federal Stimulus 3.0 Package. To view the letter sent by ASHA and Argentum yesterday evening, please click below.

March 10, 2020

To access the PowerPoint that was used during yesterday’s ASHA – Argentum COVID-19 webinar featuring JoAnne Carlin of Willis Towers Watson, Kim Elliott and Mary Sue Patchett of Brookdale, Paul Gordon of Hanson Bridgett, and Linda Homan and Ruth Petran of Ecolab Healthcare please click here.

The recording of the entire 3/9/2020 webinar will be posted in the Members Only section of the ASHA Website as soon as it is available. It will be located in the Additional Resources and in the COVID-19 tabs.

March 6, 2020

ASHA members across the U.S. and Canada continue their efforts to prepare and respond to the COVID-19 virus. Brookdale Senior Living has shared their new Toolkit, which includes downloadable resources and video content, and can be accessed by clicking here.

March 2, 2020

ASHA continues to track and communicate information about the coronavirus in an effort to provide helpful strategies that you may want to consider in your company plans. February 27th we distributed an article developed by Hanson Bridgett, Coronavirus Preparedness and Response for Senior Living Communities, that includes an overview of the current state of play and key strategies for how to prepare and respond. Additionally, ASHA and Argentum are working together on a webinar, Coronavirus Preparedness and Response Strategies, scheduled for Monday, March 9, 2020, 1:00 pm EST, featuring key experts who will share their views from the operating, legal, risk and clinical side of this potential crisis and provide you the opportunity to ask questions or otherwise engage in this dialogue.

January 28, 2020

The American Seniors Housing Association (ASHA) announces the Senior Living Hall of Fame's 2019 class of inductees who will be inaugurated during the association's 2020 annual meeting in Palm Desert, CA on January 23rd. The following inductees will be honored: • Lynne Katzmann, Ph.D., Juniper Communities • Alice and Emmett Koelsch, Koelsch Communities • Margaret Wylde, Ph.D., ProMatura Group The Senior Living Hall of Fame recognizes the visionaries who have distinguished themselves through uncommon foresight and ground-breaking innovation. These are industry leaders with an unwavering commitment to community lifestyles that enhance choice, independence, dignity and personalized service. Lynne Katzmann, Ph.D. • Founded senior living organization guided by the principles of corporate social entrepreneurship • Pioneered integrated care model to participate in capitated and risk-based reimbursement Lynne Katzmann founded Juniper Communities, which invests in, develops and operates senior living and long-term care communities at the age of thirty-two. Bringing with her no financial backing, a mere six year’s business experience and a PhD in economics, her mission was to improve the last years of life for seniors. Katzmann believed that a woman could and should lead this business where the customers—staff, residents and family caregivers—were predominantly women. Her goal was to make Juniper profitable for investors; and as a founder of the then nascent corporate social entrepreneurship movement, she would adhere to the double bottom line: doing well by doing good. Today, 31 years later, CEO Katzmann continues to actively lead Juniper, now with 22 properties in three states. Juniper is ranked #12 by Crain’s New York on its annual Top 50 ranking of woman-owned companies for the New York tri-state area. Juniper’s investors have enjoyed double digit annual returns while her residents, their families and Juniper Associates give the company high marks on annual customer satisfaction studies. Health-related metrics, such as low hospital readmissions, support Juniper achievements with hard data indicators. Juniper has developed and now shared a pioneering model of integrated care that will better position Juniper and other senior living operators to participate in capitated and risk-based reimbursement. Called Connect4Life, the program integrates with other services using a “high-tech/high-touch” communications protocol that transfers information through an electronic health record (EHR) and coordinates care through a human navigator. Lynne is now launching an operator-sponsored Medicare Advantage I-SNP, collaborating with Christian Living Communities, Englewood, CO, and Ohio Living, Columbus, OH. Under The Perennial Consortium banner, the group plans to go live with the network in 2021 and to expand via partnerships with additional operator stakeholders. Alice and Emmett Koelsch • Opened the Delaware Plaza in 1971, one of the first communities in the nation to provide “assisted living” • Laid the groundwork for three family-owned and operated senior living organizations: Koelsch Communities, Jerry Erwin Associates and Weatherly Inns, totaling over 100 communities nation-wide Emmett and Alice Koelsch risked it all on a shuttered nursing home in 1958. Guided by their family values and deeply held faith, they became innovators and leaders in the seniors housing industry. The Koelsch family story is one of classic American success. Emmett Koelsch started his life on a farm in Great Bend, KS, and moved to Longview, WA at 17-years-old where he worked various jobs as a milkman, construction worker, and horse logger. He met Alice at the St. Helen’s Inn, where she was waiting tables. They both started at Reynolds Metals, where Emmett was employed before and after his service during World War II. After 21 years and rising to a management position, Emmett left Reynolds Metals to pursue a new business: Seniors housing. Emmett and Alice Koelsch started their family business in 1958 with the acquisition of a nursing home in Kelso, WA that had 52 beds, all of them empty. They moved themselves and their five children into the basement of the nursing home and got to work, buying or building every nursing home in Cowlitz County over the next 10 years. In 1971, the couple had an idea: Provide care for those who could not live alone but did not require skilled nursing services. They built the Delaware Plaza in Longview, WA, providing meals, housekeeping and medication management for their residents, 10 years before the term “assisted living” was coined. Emmett and Alice built a highly respected senior living business over the next 25 years. When they retired, all five of their children followed in their footsteps, starting their own seniors housing businesses with the foundation that Emmett and Alice laid. These businesses now operate over 100 communities in 21 states. The Koelsch children have never lost the values instilled by Emmett and Alice: Courtesy, integrity and treating everyone with dignity and respect. Margaret Wylde, Ph.D. • Founded ProMatura Group in 1984, specializing in 55+ age-qualified research, planning and programming • Author of numerous research studies examining customer attributes and preferences Dr. Margaret Wylde started ProMatura Group in 1984 and since that time has conducted an extensive body of research that has significantly improved the collective understanding of the 55+ market. The numerous and noteworthy research studies she has led include: Prospective Independent Living Customers: Key Findings from a Study of Prospects and Hold Outs (2013); Unlocking the Mystery Behind Very Satisfied Customers: Make Them Feel at Home (2014); Senior Living Technology Report (2017); and People, Place, Programming: Quality of Life in Assisted Living (2019). In addition, Dr. Wylde has had a significant impact on community planning research that defines lifestyles, residences, amenities, services, payment plans, and pricing across North America, Europe and Australia. ProMatura's age-qualified housing expertise spans empty nester (55+) housing, as well as independent living, assisted living, care for those with Alzheimer's disease or other forms of dementia, continuing care retirement communities, and nursing care. ProMatura has collected data since 2003 for use by investors and developers of age-qualified, service-enriched housing and provides this to the National Investment Center for the Seniors Housing & Care Industry (NIC), which uses the data to track key market trends quarterly.