Paradise board backs Bridge Counseling expansion to add children’s treatment and transitional housing

The Paradise Town Advisory Board voted March 11 to forward a master-plan amendment, zone change and a set of use permits and development-waiver requests for Bridge Counseling Association’s expansion, which would add a 16-bed children’s residential treatment unit and a 52-unit transitional housing building adjacent to an existing hospital on McLeod Drive.

The proposal asks to change the property’s master-plan designations from Public Use (PU) and Neighborhood Commercial (NC) to Corridor Mixed Use and to rezone the southern portion of the site from CP (Commercial Professional) to CG (Commercial General). Board members approved the master-plan amendment and zone change subject to staff conditions, and they approved the use permits, waivers and design review for the hospital expansion and associated multifamily development.

The project would keep the existing hospital building in operation and convert a warehouse building on the site into a 16-bed children’s residential outpatient treatment wing for patients 17 and younger. A separate new building on the northeast portion of the site would contain 52 one- and two-bedroom apartments intended as transitional housing for people engaged in outpatient treatment.

Liz Olson, the applicant representative, told the board that Bridge Counseling has operated on the site since April 2019 and that the multifamily portion is labeled in the plans as transitional housing. "Bridge Counseling is and has been operating on this site since 2019 as a hospital," Olson said during the presentation.

A presenter for the agency added that Bridge Counseling is a nonprofit that has provided services since 1971 and said the organization has treated more than 20,000 clients in the last 10 years. "We are a 501(c)(3) nonprofit agency. And we have treated in the last 10 years over 20,000 clients," the presenter said.

Board members discussed several waiver requests that accompany the proposal, including reductions to landscape buffers and electric-vehicle charging-space requirements, reduced curb depths and alternate driveway geometries. Staff recommended approval of most waivers; the board’s discussion focused on maintaining additional landscaping along public-use zoned property and on whether detached sidewalks should be required in this older neighborhood.

Public turnout at the hearing on this item was small; when the chair asked for a show of hands, five attendees raised hands in support and none raised hands in opposition. Several attendees said they had not received postcard notification of the applicant’s neighborhood meeting; the applicant acknowledged that a flyer circulated before the neighborhood meeting had language referring to "220 to 260 overnight beds for homeless," and said that statement was not part of the current application and constituted misinformation that the applicant attempted to correct.

The board recorded motions to approve: the master-plan amendment (item 2), the zone change (item 3) and the use permits/waivers/design review (item 4). Each motion passed by voice vote; the board chair announced they would forward the master-plan amendment to the county planning commission, which is scheduled to consider it on April 1.

The board’s approval is advisory; final approvals and any conditions are subject to County planning and the Board of County Commissioners as required for planning and zoning matters.

The board’s packet and the staff report list specific code citations and staff conditions that will carry forward to the county; members said they expect the county planner’s conditions to govern final technical requirements such as traffic mitigation, landscape screening and construction staging.