SANATOGA PA – Hallman Retirement Neighborhoods, the East High Street-based developer of the Sanatoga Ridge and Buchert Ridge senior citizen residential communities, is asking the borough of Norristown Planning Commission for permission to convert a former Catholic high school complex on Johnson Highway, Norristown, into a 191-unit housing project, the Times Herald newspaper reported Sunday (June 17, 2012).

The Kennedy-Kenrick High School building in Norristown

The proposal would adapt what once was Kennedy-Kenrick Catholic High School and its grounds to 46 housing units in the existing four-story high school building; and add 117 units in three, three-story buildings, as well as 28 single-family ranch-style homes. It is scheduled for consideration tonight (Monday, June 18) during a Planning Commission meeting at 7 p.m. in Norristown municipal hall, the newspaper said.

The company, headed by Sanatoga resident J. Wilmer “Wil” Hallman, is asking for a change to Norristown’s zoning ordinance to allow a garden apartment zone. Attorney Carrie Nase, representing the firm, said it hopes to get have re-zoning completed by the end of July and get land development approval by the end of 2012.

Planners told the commission Hallman had “worked diligently on this project,” in part by reaching out to the surrounding neighborhood “early in the process” to explain it, according to the newspaper.

• Read a story by reporter Carl Rotenberg, titled “191-unit plan for senior housing at Kennedy-Kenrick to be reviewed Monday” and published Sunday by The Times Herald, here.

Hallman’s career in building retirement communities began more than 20 years ago with the construction of Sanatoga Ridge Community, 2461 E. High St., Sanatoga, followed by the still-in-progress Buchert Ridge Community, 2011 Buchert Rd., Sanatoga. Garden-style, “green”-certified apartments have been proposed at Buchert Ridge, but construction has not yet begun.

Also in progress for Hallman is the Still Waters Retirement Community in Pennsburg.

Kennedy-Kenrick and St. Pius X High School in Lower Pottsgrove were closed, and their student bodies merged, during 2010 when the new Pope John Paul II High School opened in Royersford.

Photo from Wikipedia