News Release | What's New - The Cliffs Communities

The Cliffs Communities Gifts $1 Million to UNC-Asheville for NC Center for Health and Wellness

Asheville, NC (November 1, 2007) – The University of North Carolina Asheville and The Cliffs Communities announce today that The Cliffs is gifting $1 Million to the University’s North Carolina Center for Health & Wellness. The Center will be a hub for educating health and wellness professionals, conducting interdisciplinary research, building community and statewide partnerships, and incubating community programs around critical health and wellness issues.

The Center’s initial focus will be on three of North Carolina’s most pressing wellness concerns: childhood obesity, workplace wellness and senior wellness.

Anne Ponder, UNC Asheville Chancellor, and Jim Anthony, President and Founder of The Cliffs Communities.

Photo Credit: Chris Clevenger
"Our legislature was truly visionary in establishing the North Carolina Center for Health & Wellness," said UNC Asheville Chancellor Anne Ponder. "When we combine the talent of our students, our faculty, our neighboring universities, and our top-notch health care organizations, we will have the best possible prescription for addressing the urgent public health concerns of our region. With so much work to be done to improve the health of our state, The Cliffs Communities has stepped forward with an extraordinary gift. With their help, we will be able to make dramatic early progress in working toward this important goal."

The Cliffs Communities Founder and President Jim Anthony has a compelling belief in the importance of comprehensive well-being and now, thanks to The Cliffs' $1 million gift, UNC Asheville's efforts in promoting health across the state will expand as well. “We are a company that is committed to helping people live well,” states Mr. Anthony. “Our gift to UNC Asheville is a natural extension of our corporate values and a way for us to fully engage the surrounding community in an environment where personal goals are set and wellness ambitions are realized. We are looking forward to a long-lasting relationship with UNC Asheville and The North Carolina Center for Health & Wellness through our collaborative effort to improve the quality of life for all individuals.”

The Cliffs Communities have also demonstrated their success in working with public universities to achieve multi–dimensional benefits for students, faculty, businesses and the surrounding community. Just recently, The Cliffs announced a collaborative effort with Clemson University in developing and co-managing The Cliffs Center for Environmental Golf Research. Furman University has also been a great source of positive collaboration for The Cliffs, as Southern Living’s first ever green Showcase Home will be built at Furman with the help of The Cliffs. Zest Quest, a 501(c)(3) organization was founded four years ago by Jim Anthony and is supported by The Cliffs and other public funding with the goal of improving children’s health and activity levels. Zest Quest has grown to include 14 schools and over 7,000 students. The Cliffs Wellness Symposium, a three-day-long interactive wellness forum tackling top trends in wellness was held at the Grove Park Inn and included highly informative sessions from The Cliffs Medical Advisory Board.

Jim Anthony, President and Founder of The Cliffs Communities, shares in the excitement of the announcement.

Photo Credit: Chris Clevenger
The opportunity with UNC Asheville will be another example of what the private and public sector can achieve when they work together. Mr. Anthony states, “The North Carolina Center for Health & Wellness will be a leading catalyst for healthy living for North Carolinians of all ages, for years to come. This relationship serves to raise awareness of the gift of health and wellness across the Carolinas and beyond. The Cliffs collaboration with an outstanding public liberal arts university like UNC Asheville provides an unprecedented opportunity to address a national crisis in childhood obesity and will open new doors in workplace wellness,” concludes Mr. Anthony.

Although construction of the North Carolina Center for Health & Wellness is not slated to begin until 2008, student course work, innovative research projects and community collaborations have already begun. A new academic major in Health and Wellness Promotion is one of the most popular fields of study on campus. A host of topics are explored in the classroom, including the science of nutrition, exercise physiology, gerontology and public health. Faculty and students are working together on a range of research projects. Examples include examining fat metabolism during exercise, women's health habits and obesity, and blood lead levels among older African American men. Meanwhile, community partnerships and planning have been launched with Mission Hospitals, the North Carolina Center for Health and Aging, the Asheville/Buncombe Institute of Parity Achievement, and the Obesity Action Team.

The North Carolina Center for Health & Wellness will be located in the heart of UNC Asheville's campus, between Justice Center and Reuter Center, home to the N.C. Center for Creative Retirement. The 133,500-square-foot facility will house a dozen classrooms, research and teaching labs; strength training and aerobics rooms; offices, meeting rooms and seminar space; and a dance studio, wellness cafe and demonstration kitchen for use in nutrition courses. The facility also includes a multipurpose convocation center, the Kimmel Arena. It will have seating for 4,000 for commencement and convocation, health fairs, symposiums and national speakers, and seating for 3,400 for intercollegiate basketball.

Construction of the North Carolina Center for Health & Wellness, estimated to cost between $40 and $42 million, is funded in large part by a $35-million appropriation from the N.C. General Assembly. UNC Asheville is raising $5-$7 million in private funds. The University plans to break ground in spring 2008; construction is expected to take 18 to 24 months. The project architects are Bowers Ellis & Watson of Asheville, and HOK, an international firm that specializes in public assembly architecture.