3 Continuing Care Communities in Richmond County, New York

Rev 10/31B

My parents moved into Heritage Oaks, but they don't like it. I'm considering changing them to an independent living community somewhere else. They don't like the place, so right now they're still there, but we might be changing. The admissions representative was very accommodating, very nice, and very helpful. There was lots of information, she was very informed, and she was very informative. She was awesome. The staff there is OK. The issue is with the food. They run out of food, they don't have enough food. For dinner, if you go in at 5:00 and it starts at 4:00, they run out of chicken for example. My parents are not happy with the food choices and the condition of the food. They know it's not going to be like the food, they cook but they at least expect for grits to be consistent and look like grits and the French toast to not look like they're spoon bread but to look like French toast. That is some of the feedback they gave me. They don't like the idea that they don't have their own kitchen. They have a kitchen there, but they just have the refrigerator and countertop space. They want to be able to, if the food is not good, taste their own food, but they don't have a stove or an oven. They can walk around the building, it's spacious, kind of like a hotel. They don't have an outside trail, but they have a nice little front area with chairs and they have a backyard. They have a small garden in the backyard and I guess people can walk around the building. It's like a backyard area with green grass and a couple of gardens out there. The response for maintenance requests is low and the food could be a lot better and you don't really want them to run out of food. I think that will make a difference for my parents if they had their own kitchen, so that even though the food is bad they could cook their own food. They do have a kitchen, they have a common area at Heritage Oaks, they have a movie theater room, they have a laundry room in each suite area of each floor, but my dad didn't feel like the kitchen was open for him to use. I don't know if there's someone in this place that told him no one uses the kitchen. So when the guy told him that no one uses a kitchen, he took it like "I can't use the kitchen when I want," although the salesperson said you can use it whenever you want. So I would just make sure that everybody is on the same page and given the same message.

JB

I visited Heritage Oaks. They have an open dining plan, meaning, you can dine from 7 in the morning until 6 at night without having any set time that you have to eat breakfast, lunch or dinner. One of the things that I was looking for is the ability to have plank on the floor versus carpet, and they said that was possible. They have a beautiful walk-in storage closet that was phenomenal. You could lay down in there almost; it's so big. Those were the three things that really stuck out to me. Heritage Oaks was amiable to making some changes in the apartment. It was very neat and clean, the whole nine yards.

Stuart

My mom moved into Heritage Oaks, and she seems to like it a lot. She really does seem to be very happy with the place. I think she's pretty happy with the food, she's been kind of getting adjusted, she hasn't spent as much time there as she would like.

Ophelia

Heritage Oaks was very lovely and fabulous, but the location didn't work. It was too far out. Everybody was friendly. It was large.

Marci

I like Heritage Oaks a lot. As far as the physical plant, it was clean and neat. We had a meal there, and the food was a tiny bit better than the food at the other places. The woman that we dealt with there was very nice, knowledgeable about her product, and showed us a furnished apartment and then the exact same apartment empty and that made a huge difference. It was a 1-bedroom that we saw, and it had a living room furniture, a little kitchen table, bedroom furniture, lots of closet space, lots of light, and nothing looked crowded. It was very nice and well appointed, and they had lots of activities. I like the park-like grounds and there was more green space around their building, but parking was a little bit of a challenge.