Then someone would say that such a little buzz can’t lead to anything good. Christian entertained with an anecdote about a joint flight to Madrid, on which he convinced Jürgen Salzhuber, until recently chairman of the Thomas Wimmer Foundation, to take a look at the Awo retirement home in Penzberg, which ultimately led to the purchase of the property Schulz, head of the Awo village Hasenbergl in Munich, the guests on Tuesday. They had come to the opening of the extension on Gartenstrasse. The Munich foundation has invested 14.7 million euros in the new building with 63 nursing rooms and ten apartments for assisted living. The fact that it finally came about is also thanks to a few cans of Spanish Mahou beer – if you believe Schulz’s words.
District President Josef Mederer emphasized in his welcoming address how important it is to offer short-term and day care places. Deputy District Administrator Wolfgang Taffertshofer, who particularly liked the fact that the retirement home was centrally located in the city of Penzberg, also acknowledged this. Mayor Stefan Korpan promised to create affordable housing for the facility’s staff. The City Council took up the issue.
Two-bed rooms, but also single rooms await their residents. All are bright and generously furnished.
(Photo: Harry Wolfsbauer)
With so much praise, the time was forgotten when the retirement home on Gartenstraße made headlines in the local press: namely when the contract between the city and the long-standing operator, the district association Awo Oberbayern, was terminated and a private sponsor took over the house. After the city council realized that the private sponsor, Novita, might not have been a good successor, the home and land were sold to the Thomas Wimmer Foundation in 2018. From the start, she made no secret of the fact that she didn’t want to work with Novita. Instead, the Awo München-Stadt should operate the facility. This only happened in October of the following year. Novita’s lawsuits in court were unsuccessful. It was Salzhuber who was the only one to speak of “wild times” on Tuesday. The Thomas-Wimmer-Foundation had not only taken over an unwelcome operator, but also the requirement of the home supervision to modernize the facility in accordance with the legal requirements.
During the tour of the three-storey new building, which has not yet been completely completed, the guests were impressed by the bright, friendly rooms. 63 rooms with a total of 83 places and an alternative room are available. 21 are designed as two-bed rooms, 32 as wheelchair-accessible single rooms. There are ten apartments on the third floor with a distant view of the Benediktenwand. These apartments for assisted living were expressly desired by the city and were subsidized with 200,000 euros. However, the construction of the extension did not go smoothly. The Penzberg underground caused problems again. The construction company encountered not only peat and water, but also rock, which required the use of special equipment. This delayed completion by three months. In addition, the costs increased. Originally, 16.6 million euros were planned for the new building. The investment now stands at 17.4 million euros.
In the existing building, which opened in 1978, 660,000 euros have already been invested in the renovation of 13 nursing rooms. A good two million euros are to flow into the further renovation. A day care with ten places is planned. In the future, 22 places will be available for so-called young care. In the listed beneficiary building, geriatric psychiatric residential groups (24 places) are planned.