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Eagle County is getting older.

The Eagle County Regional Housing Needs Assessment contains a mountain of data about the valley’s population. In that mountain is a nugget about how our population is aging.

According to the data, the county’s population of senior citizens has increased since 2010. The share of the population aged 65 and older more than doubled between 2010 and 2022 from 6% to 14%.

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Meanwhile, the population aged 45 and younger is shrinking, from 69% in 2010 to 59% in 2022.

The crew at Castle Peak Senior Life and Rehabilitation sees many of the valley’s older residents.

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“The need for senior care in the valley has never been greater,” Castle Peak executive director Shelly Cornish said, adding that occupancy at the center has been “solid” since the center opened roughly eight years ago.

Castle Peak’s clients are made up of a couple of different groups — those there for short-term rehabilitation stints and those there for longer-term stays.

Those at Castle Peak for short-term stays usually come fresh from hospital stays before going home, and are generally in the facility for 18 days or so, getting healthy before going home.

Those who arrive for the longer term usually spend the rest of their days at Castle Peak. Cornish noted those stays are usually between 18 months and two years, although one resident has been at the facility since it opened.

There’s a constant need

There’s a waiting list for those spots.

While there’s a constant need for those spots, and there’s “never a day we don’t get a referral,” Cornish said there’s “no thought” to expanding Castle Peak’s residential facilities. The problem is cost, she said.

That cost is a problem, in part, due to the fact that about 60% of Castle Peak’s residents in the skilled nursing section are Medicaid patients and state reimbursements don’t cover the full cost of those residents’ care. Since Castle Peak is a nonprofit operation, it’s obligated to care for everyone, so that means the gap has to be covered somehow.

That gap has required county subsidies for the past couple of years, and Castle Peak has another request in the 2025 budget.

Beyond Castle Peak, Eagle County’s government is working on expanding services for older residents.

Eagle County Public Health Director Heath Harmon noted that as the county’s population ages, the county’s services need to evolve to keep up. The county conducted a community health assessment in 2023, a big part of which was older adults and their needs.

That assessment included conversations with residents at the county’s senior centers in El Jebel, Eagle and Minturn. People there were already involved in the county’s healthy aging program, and talked about several things, including places to gather and ways to make their indoor environments safer. Older residents have also talked about a need to downsize from their current homes.

A lack of home health care

Harmon added that access to medical care has also been a frequent topic of conversation, particularly since the valley has lost its home health service.

Those conversations were “really helpful,” Harmon said.

There’s a need for better transportation to get older residents to and from medical appointments. But, Harmon noted, reviving some form of home health care — there are currently conversations taking place with Eagle County Paramedic Services to revive at least some of those services — could reduce the need for some of those transportation needs.

As the county’s population continues to age, Cornish was asked where the community and state need to focus in the coming years.

Cornish said we need to pay attention to an aging workforce, although that seems to be an area in which the community is doing pretty well.

At the state level, Cornish said state leaders need to make “seniors important in the state budget, reimbursing us for the care we provide.”

Cornish advised people who are passing their 65th birthday to stay active, physically and mentally.

“The people who age the best have a great attitude,” she said. “There’s blessings all over,” Cornish added. “You’ve got to look for them.”