THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, August 17, 1994 TAG: 9408160367
SECTION: MILITARY NEWS PAGE: A10 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY PAUL W. VALENTINE, THE WASHINGTON POST
DATELINE: FAIRFAX LENGTH: Medium: 73 lines
With the nation's ever-growing elderly population, retirement communities are popping up across the countryside.
But the 382-unit Fairfax community 12 miles south of Washington is one with a twist: It is primarily for retired military officers and their spouses.
Built on the concept of ``affinity housing'' for people of kindred backgrounds and interests, the Fairfax, with its complex of cottages and apartments surrounded by 56 acres of meadows, trees and gardens, has been home for hundreds of Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine and Coast Guard retirees since 1989.
More recently, it has opened to retired members of the U.S. Foreign Service, U.S. Public Health Service and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and their spouses.
``The camaraderie of the people we live with every day is the crowning point,'' said Leo M. Neff, 75, a retired Air Force colonel, who saw action in World War II and was a supply pilot for the Berlin Airlift in 1948 and 1949.
``We swap war stories all the time,'' he said, adding with a smile, ``We only tell true lies.''
Inside, the community center, library, gift shop, dining room and other facilities bustle with residents and their guests. Outside, others tend gardens, use walking trails and fly-cast in a nine-acre lake stocked with 20,000 fish. The virtually self-sufficient community also includes a convenience store, barber shop, beauty parlor, auditorium, bank, exercise room, heated indoor pool and interdenominational chapel.
``There's always something to do,'' said Helen Elson, 79, ticking off the drama club, literary circle, dance classes, dinner parties, bridge, mah-johngg and a range of arts and crafts. ``It's not an old folks' home.''
Elson is the widow of a retired Army chaplain, Col. Edward L.R. Elson, whose service included being chaplain of the U.S. Senate from 1969 to 1981. The Fairfax community was ``very supportive'' at the time of his death last year at age 86, she said.
Built by the Marriott Corp. and operated by its Senior Living Services branch, the Fairfax is located near Fort Belvoir. In addition to its 382 apartments and cottages for active retirees, it has 45 assisted-living units, as well as a 60-bed nursing care center for incapacitated residents.
The community provides shuttle bus transportation to Fort Belvoir, where medical, commissary and recreational facilities are available.
Residents pay an entrance fee and a monthly maintenance or lease fee thereafter. Two fee plans allow residents to pay either a relatively large entrance fee with a correspondingly lower monthly fee, or a smaller entrance fee and larger monthly payments.
Under the first plan, entrance fees start at $101,100 for a one-bedroom apartment with a $1,344 monthly fee and go up to $373,000 for a three-bedroom cottage with a $1,886 monthly payment. Under the second plan, entrance fees range from $50,550 with a $1,730 monthly payment of $186,000 with a $2,954 monthly fee. One meal a day is covered in the monthly fee, as well as weekly housekeeping and utilities.
The entrance fee is 95 percent refundable to the resident if he or she moves away or to the estate at death. Ninety-six percent of the units at the Fairfax are occupied and turnover is slow, according to Nancy E. George, director of sales.
The Fairfax is governed by a residents association that deals with Marriott on matters ranging from expenditures to resident programs.
Though most of the residents are retired generals, colonels or other top officers, there is little observance of rank, residents say.
``We go mostly by first names and not by rank,'' Helen Elson said
``I can honestly say we've made more friends here in the last three years than in the previous 20,'' Leo Neff said. ``. . . There are no strangers here, only friends who haven't met.'' by CNB