Expenditure totalling more than £30m has been approved to replace three care homes with two new purpose-built care and support hubs.
Senior officers at North Yorkshire Council have agreed to fund the facilities in Harrogate and Scarborough to reduce growing pressures on health and adult services budgets caused by the rising demand for dementia care.
The council-run hubs will replace the existing Station View care home in Harrogate, the Silver Birches home in Filey and Larpool Lane home, Whitby.
A site in the town’s Ainsty Road has been earmarked for a £15.7m facility in Harrogate, while the council proposes that Scarborough’s £16.9m hub is built in Middle Deepdale in Eastfield.
Both hubs would have 60 beds, with care provided to people leaving hospital requiring bed-based intermediate care as well as dementia sufferers.
Hannah Brown, the council’s commissioning and provider services development manager, said in a report that the hubs were proposed as part of a “market management intervention” to address the escalating pressures on health and adult services (HAS) budgets.
She added:
“One of the main drivers of the pressures on HAS budgets is the requirement to purchase increasing levels of high-cost specialist residential dementia care in the independent care sector.
“The cost of such provision is often further increased by the requirement to fund additional 1:1 hours to meet a person’s needs, which is not only
costly but can represent a highly restrictive model of care.”
In Harrogate, residential dementia placements as a proportion of all residential care placements have increased by 12 per cent in the last two years, while in Scarborough the figure was ten per cent.
Council officers have calculated that the two new hubs would save the authority up to £6.3m a year.
The report noted that the Station View facility, which was built in 1981, needs substantial investment to remain safe and operational, with maintenance costs already exceeding £300,000 over four years and a further £1.9m of repairs and fire safety works expected in the coming years.
The Filey and Whitby homes were both built in the 1970s.
They also require major investment to remain safe, with more than £1.1m already spent on maintenance over four years and a further £3.5m needed in the years ahead.
Officers say the new hubs have been designed using dementia care best practice, with safe and accessible layouts, adaptable spaces and specialist features aimed at supporting rehabilitation, independence and long-term care needs.
Planning permission is due to be sought for the facilities this summer with work due to start in June 2027 and the hubs opening in August 2028.
Three more care and support hubs are planned to replace four other ageing care homes as part of a £60m overhaul of dementia care in the county.
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