Touchmark breaks ground on 244-home senior campus in South Anchorage

Touchmark, a privately held senior living company based in Beaverton, Oregon, broke ground Wednesday on Touchmark at Hillside, a 244-home retirement campus on 14 acres at O'Malley Road and Lake Otis Parkway in South Anchorage. The project is expected to bring about 100 year-round jobs, according to a press release from Mayor Suzanne LaFrance's office.

The plans call for 120 independent living condos, 34 villa homes, 58 assisted living apartments and 32 memory care homes, which serve residents with dementia or other memory loss.

The mayor's office says Touchmark is among the latest developments to use the municipality's multifamily property tax incentive, which lowers the property taxes a project owes. LaFrance proposed the program, and the Anchorage Assembly approved it on April 22, 2025, as part of her 10,000 Homes in Ten Years strategy. Under the ordinance, projects that add at least eight homes and win the assessor's approval don't pay property taxes on their new housing units for a base of 20 years, starting after construction is finished. Projects can earn bonus years for location, mixed use, affordable units, prevailing wages and apprenticeships, or converting parking to housing, up to a maximum of 28 years. The land and any ineligible buildings stay taxable.

The ordinance, AO 2025-35(S-1), is aimed at rental housing. It excludes units rented for less than 30 days and says owner-occupied units, beyond the first one, are "not eligible for this housing tax incentive." The release does not say whether Touchmark's 120 independent living condos will be sold or rented, or how that part of the project qualifies.

LaFrance said in the release that high construction costs leave families and seniors with fewer choices, and that the incentive lets partners like Touchmark "invest in Anchorage, build new homes." Touchmark President Jay Leo said older Alaskans "should have more choices for how and where they live."

The mayor's housing strategy aims for 1,000 homes a year, counting both new units and major renovations. Anchorage permitted about 400 new units in 2025, as Alaska News has reported. Anchorage's three housing tax incentive programs exempted a combined $378,561 in property taxes this year, according to the municipal assessor's annual report. The Assembly recently shelved a separate LaFrance tax break for first-time buyers of new homes, 11-1.

At an Aug. 25 town hall, the municipality listed Touchmark among projects under construction. The release carries statements only from the mayor and Touchmark. It does not give a completion date or say when the first residents could move in.