The former Grant’s Lick Elementary School building could soon be transformed into a senior living facility.
The Campbell County Planning and Zoning Commission unanimously approved a zone map amendment and stage one plans for the old school building at 944 Clay Ridge Road to be adapted into the senior living campus.
The site consists of two large attached buildings. The original structure was built in 1936 with an addition in 1958. A second structure was constructed in 1990. This is where the proposed design could take place.
“Our comprehensive plan speaks to the need for residential housing in Campbell County,” said Campbell County Planning and Zoning Commissioner Justin Verst. “It speaks to the need for housing for different ages. Particularly, we do have a lack of senior housing. I think this reuse is a good use of the property.”
The plan involves remodeling 21,200 square feet of the building into 26 living units. The existing kitchen and cafeteria will serve as a dining area and a senior-community gathering space.
The oldest building is roughly 10,800 square feet. The plans for this structure are to be determined as part of a “future phase.” Plans call for future phases of the site to include related independent senior living (14 units) and an adult daycare.
“The footprint of the school isn’t changing, they’re just parsing it out into this new section, the 1990 section, being assisted living, and then the future phase thinking that might be independent senior living,” said Kirk Hunter, principal planner at Campbell County Planning and Zoning.
The area under review consists of 6.27 acres in unincorporated Campbell County. The applicant, Zack Jacob, has the site under contract.
“We’re all local Northern Kentucky residents,” Jacob said. “We’ve heard some rumors that this is going to be a big corporation coming in, but that is not the case.”
Jacob said there were also rumors that this development was subsidized housing. He said it is not.
“What we looked at was either somebody comes in and makes a change to the school, leaving the framework the way it is, but making a new business out of it, or the building gets demolished, and land gets sold and turned into something else,” Jacob said.
Six residents spoke at Tuesday’s meeting. One question that came up repeatedly is if the senior living facility doesn’t work out, could high-density housing go there instead due to the zone change,
“We’ve got all these different things happening in this area, and now on top of this, we want to put in assisted living,” said resident Chris Holmes. “I’m very concerned about having the company come in when I see what’s going to happen with the change to R3, which will allow multifamily dwellings. Things don’t work out with this, company decides to sell. What’s going to happen in the future? I don’t want to see that in Grant’s Lick.”
There is no sanitary sewer connection line on the site to the public system, which, Campbell County Planning and Zoning Director Cindy Minter said, means nothing of high density can be built on the site.
“The public sanitary sewer system stops at about the entrance to A.J. Park, which would be several miles down the road,” Minter said. “So you’re really not going to get a larger facility at this site because of the lack of connection to a public sanitary sewer system. If somebody were to build a new apartment complex on this site, we would request that it be connected to that.”
Minter said in this case it is an adaptive reuse, so the assisted living facility did not have to connect to the public sanitary sewer system.
“A large-scale development, multifamily development like that would not, in my opinion, meet the comprehensive plan, and wouldn’t have justification for zone change,” said Verst.
Another issue residents brought up was traffic. Jacob said that the 26 assisted living rooms, plus employees, will generate less traffic than the school previously did.
The Grant’s Lick Elementary School sign will be retained and rebranded for the project. Portions of the existing front parking lot will be removed, and the asphalt will be replaced with landscaping.
A senior living facility is a conditional use in this zone, meaning it requires separate approval from the Campbell County Board of Adjustments. That hearing is scheduled for Aug. 18. The zone map amendment will also have to go to the Campbell County Fiscal Court for final consideration.
The plans do not include a timeline for development.
