The NFL’s concussion settlement has been atop the national sports headlines and we see a ground breaking project right in our back yard that will help many of those retirees battling neurological disorders.
Thursday morning the NFL Alumni association along with Validus, a Florida based senior living company, teamed up in order to break ground on its first ever state-of-the-art assisted living and memory care center specifically tailored to ex-NFL players.
“This is a historic for the NFL Alumni and Validus assisted living. There are 18,000 former NFL players out there with a majority of the guys needing help,” NFL Alumni Association Chairman Ron Jaworski said.
“This partnership will give the guys the opportunity to live their life with dignity, proper medical care, and supervision. I serve on the board of the NFL Alumni and I take that job very seriously and this is a good thing to do, the right thing to do –it’s a great partnership and we are going to help a lot of football players in the NFL.”
The facility will offer many amenities including a pool, fishing dock, and putting greens.
“The focus is really not that different than any other resident who has Alzheimers or Dementia but we do have to do certain things right,” Validus Senior VP Rebecca Lingold explained.
“These guys are not little guys, they’re 6’1, 6’2, 6’7 so just down to the furniture and how we buy the beds and furnish will be different. But the holistic approach to assistive care isn’t really different we just have to buy bigger furniture for them.”
These facilities weren’t around when Sylvia Mackey was taking care of her husband—Pro Hall of Fame tight end John Mackey--so she spearheaded the campaign and witnessed years of hard work come to life.
“It makes me feel good that there will be a place for these players to turn because unfortunately with no cure things aren’t going to get better the numbers are not going to diminish—they will need a place to go,” Mackey said.
“I wish I had a place like this that I knew of right away. Where I knew down the road John could go to and that I’d be happy with.”
This is the first facility in the country to break ground with this concept in hand. There are 33 in total set to be complete in the next five years, the other 32 based in NFL franchise cities.