A smile creeps across the face of Hill N’ Park President Flo Jean Whitehead as she talks about the impact of seeing the brand-new Hill N’ Park Senior Center for the first time.

“It was a dream come true,” Whitehead said. “We were almost moved to tears. Most of us just couldn’t believe it was actually happening.”

The emotion Whitehead felt at the opening of the senior center — which took place at a ribbon cutting on May 7 of this year — is better understood considering how it’s being utilized. The new kitchen inside the renovated 2,800 square-foot center facilitates senior meals every Wednesday through Weld County’s Area Agency on Aging’s (AAA) Friendly Fork Program. A large dining room provides plenty of space for community members to enjoy food, good conversation and laughter. Activity and multipurpose rooms are utilized for bingo and arts and crafts, and discussions with the High Plains Library District about a future computer lab are transforming the new senior center beyond a new building. It’s becoming a focal point of the community, an impressive accomplishment considering its previous state.

For years, Hill N’ Park, a subdivision established in 1973 in unincorporated Weld County, has struggled to obtain community amenities and services that its residents have yearned for. Since the 1990s, Hill N’ Park residents had utilized a repurposed double-wide trailer as a makeshift senior center for community residents, but over time it became less and less acceptable in terms of safety.

“The old senior center was basically a dilapidated trailer from 1974,” said Meredith Skoglund, Community Outreach Manager for AAA. “The porch had uneven flooring, which is a hazard for anyone, but for seniors especially. The floor was warped in the kitchen from leaking sinks and a leaking dishwasher. Someone had to go under the trailer and put supports in there. The roof started leaking, the windows were broken. You name it. It was not a safe place for them.”

All of these issues were compounded by dangerous asbestos being discovered throughout the structure.

Cheri Witt-Brown, the CEO of Greeley-Weld Habitat for Humanity, recalls when the idea of combining forces with Weld County to build a new senior center started to pick up steam. In 2018, Habitat began working with seniors at Hill N’ Park to explore the possibility of building a new senior center, and a couple of years later the ball really got rolling.

“Habitat and Weld County really began a long-term strategic effort during the COVID pandemic in 2020,” Witt-Brown said. “We had a partnership with the Colorado Health Foundation and took a survey from residents to see what kind of amenities they would value. Almost 50% of the 800 residents at Hill N’ Park responded, and of course, a community center or senior center was high on the list of priorities.”

From there, a meaningful partnership between Weld County Government, Habitat and Roche Constructors moved the project quickly from an idea to reality. 

AAA helped determine that the senior board at Hill N’ Park officially owned the land that the original senior center sat on. This led to Kelly Morrison, the Division Head of AAA, applying for a grant to begin the project. Funds were competitively awarded from 2021’s Senate Bill 290, which provided $15 million to establish the AAA grant program for programs aiding older Coloradoans. After that, planning for the senior center began in earnest.

“The partnership has been exceptional,” Witt-Brown said. “The Weld County commissioners have been excited and supportive of improvements at Hill N’ Park, and of course the county stepped up in a huge way to write the grant. Habitat stepped in to really build awareness as a project manager and to help document and demonstrate how needed a new community center was. Hiring Roche Constructors was huge, because we knew they could build it a lot faster than we could.”

After the old center was demolished, ground was officially broken on the new senior center on Aug. 1, 2023, and it opened less than a year later.

“There were a lot of hands on the ground working,” Skoglund said. “It was truly a team effort. We all worked together toward a common goal and got on the same page to get the outcome we were looking for.”

Whitehead, who has lived in Greeley since 2016 and is currently serving her third term as Hill N’ Park’s president, is proud to have a new senior center and is eager for more people to utilize it in the future. Ultimately, she’d like to see the center have an even greater reach. She’s currently attempting to position the center as a meeting place for monthly outings to the movies and restaurants but also wants activities at the center to cater to many different interests in hopes of garnering more members.

“We’d like to get started with some of the AAA programs like Fresh Conversations and Tai Chi to draw some more people in as well,” Whitehead said. “We’re really striving to get more membership, provide more activities and meet more people’s social needs.”

The coming plans for the center are vast and varied and the future looks bright for seniors in the Hill N’ Park community.

“We want to make sure supportive services are available to all our seniors and want to partner them with our information and assistance team, so they always have what they need,” Skoglund said. “We’re excited to see the overall growth and to hopefully entice more people in the community to go there.”

Whitehead’s message to Weld County residents is even more succinct.

“We’re open, and we’d like you to come and join us! Come check us out,” she said.

As the household hazardous waste facility in Greeley turns 30 years old, take a peak behind the curtain of the facility and learn about its benefit to residents and the environment across three decades.