Finding affordable housing can be a challenge in rural counties where apartment developments are rare. In Estill County, developers celebrated the opening of a new complex specifically designed for seniors in the area.Garden Pla ce Apartments cut the ribbon on its 30 units for seniors in the area.The need for affordable housing is tremendous, especially in Estill County and surrounding counties, said David Estepp, executive director of Kentucky River Foothills Development Council, Inc. This project met those needs. It's safe. It's affordable, a place they can call home, a place they can have some peace, and they can build a community.These apartments provide a place for seniors 62 and older to move and live in without worrying about home maintenance and ownership costs.It's people who have been in the communities who live in places where they struggle to keep those places livable, Estepp said. Maybe it's a water or sewer issue. Maybe the floors are falling in. They just need a place where they can just pay a rent and just live.During Tuesdays grand opening, some who have already moved in attended the ribbon cutting. That included William Horton, who held the scissors to cut the ribbon. Horton shared he left Lee County in 2019 to live closer to his daughter.I had a beautiful home up Beattyville right in the city limits, Horton said. I was down here one Saturday and she said, Daddy, won't you just sell your house up in Beattyville and move down here? That makes it closer to the doctors.Horton moved in to Garden Place three weeks ago. One of the aspects that appealed to him was the fact that the doors to the apartment rooms are connected by a hallway, rather than facing the outdoors.I love the way that the place is built, he said. There's no outside doors to it from here. You're always in a hallway coming to your place. In the winter when you open your door, you don't have all that cold air hitting you right in the face.With this complex officially open, Estepp hopes it will be a blueprint to future affordable senior living options in other counties they serve.My hope is that we could build one of these in Powell County and in Clark County and Madison County, he said. ...read more read less