Fairwood Village Retirement, a retirement community on Spokanes North Side, plans to begin work on a $6 million expansion within the next four months.


The project will include adding about 40 units to one of the campuss 10 multi-unit independent-living facilities, and another 45 units to its single-story, 11,000-square-foot assisted-living facility, says Ron Knutson, who owns Fairwood Village with his wife, Joyce.


In independent living, retirees live on their own without help; in assisted-living, they have some assistance. Of the 45 new units in the assisted-living facility, 30 will be set aside for victims of Alzheimers disease and other forms of dementia, while the remaining 15 will be for residents who require assisted-living care.


The retirement complex, which currently includes 131 units for independent seniors and 15 assisted-living units, is located on about 20 acres of land north of Hastings Road, just west of Mead High School.


Knutson expects to begin work first on the planned expansion of the 36,000-square-foot independent-living facility, which will add a total of 100,000 square feet of space on three stories, says Al French, the Spokane architect who designed the project. That new space also will house new activity areas, office space for staff members, and a decorative interior fountain, says French, of International Design, of Spokane. That independent-living facility currently houses 24 units.


The new independent-living units are expected to range in size from about 600 square feet to 1,200 square feet of floor space, French says. Of the 40 planned units, 23 will have one bedroom, while the remaining 17 will have two bedrooms.


Meanwhile, Knutson says he expects to begin work on the planned 25,000-square-foot expansion of the communitys 15-unit assisted-living facility about a month after starting the first project. The entire expansion should be completed and ready to occupy by late next summer, Knutson says. He says the addition to the assisted-living facility is needed to accommodate some of the communitys independent seniors who now need more assistance and would move to the new units. The current assisted-living facility is at capacity.


We sort of have created the need ourselves, Knutson says. People here sometimes need additional care, but they hate to move somewhere else to get it, he says.


SK Construction, of Spokane, is the general contractor on the expansion. SK Construction is owned by the Knutson family.


In addition to Fairwood Village, the Knutsons own Churchill Clubhouse Estates, a 189-unit retirement facility in Eugene, Ore., and co-own Evergreen Estates, a 102-unit retirement complex in Clarkston, Wash.