Abingdon Council Backs Assisted-Living Project

ABINGDON, Va. – The Town Council voted unanimously Monday to support the issuance of a certificate of need by the Virginia Department of Health for Smith/Packett Med-Com to build a continuing care retirement community here.

The council also voted 5-0 to go forward with the purchase of property to be resold to the developer for the project. The property, once planned for a recreation complex by the town and Washington County, is on Lee Highway between Exits 19 and 22 of Interstate 81.

The support for Smith/Packett, which has been involved for three years in an effort to develop the project here, came despite an 11th-hour plea from a different health care company that the town instead consider its potential to develop a nursing home project.

“We’re honored,” said Hunter Smith, partner with Smith/Packett, after the council’s vote. “They’re receptive to us and the community wants it. You can’t ask for a better place to work.”

Kimberly Clark, administrator of Valley Health Care Center, a nursing home in Chilhowie, Va., said she attended the meeting on behalf of Abingdon Health Care Center, which would build a related facility and intends to file an application for the same certificate of public need.

She contends, according to a written statement, that the contract involving the town purchase of property and resale of the property to Smith/Packett is “void and unenforceable.”

She said town support for Smith/Packett would be “premature at best” without hearing more information about other options. She pointed to her facility’s decades of serving health care needs in the area and said the town shouldn’t favor one company over another.

She would not comment on any specifics of the project or on the likelihood of a lawsuit if the town proceeds with support of Smith/Packett.

The council discussed the issue in closed session with legal counsel prior to its decision to go ahead with purchase of the property. Clark’s objection arose during a public hearing on the purchase during Monday’s regular council meeting.

Town Attorney Deborah Icenhour and Town Manager Greg Kelly, also an attorney, noted in open session that the required procedures had been met for public hearings.

“The firm of Smith/Packett has been coming to Abingdon for the past three years to try to attempt to find a location suitable for constructing a 120-bed nursing facility in the Abingdon area as well as to address the need of the growing senior population in health care,” Kelly said before the council voted to support the company’s application for a certificate of need. “Various petitions have been circulated, Smith/Packett has been to the area several times giving presentations for this.”

He also pointed to letters from U.S. Rep. Rick Boucher, D-9th, and state Delegates Terry Kilgore, R-Gate City, and Joe Johnson, D-Abingdon, in support of the project.

Smith, whose company has two operating retirement communities and two more under way, says the next step is rezoning of the site, which he said is in the process at the county level.

“We’re moving down the path,” he said. “We’re going to build this community. It’s not ifs; we’re doing everything we can to not only build it but build it as soon as possible.”

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