Senior living community names new leader

BRADENTON — Water's Edge of Bradenton, a 108-unit senior living facility currently undergoing a $15.9 million expansion, named Penny Smith executive director.

Smith comes to Bradenton after spending nearly eight years as executive director of Kensington Place, a 126-unit independent/assisted living retirement community in Columbus, Ohio. Before that, according to a release, she was director of marketing for National Church Residences, in the home care/hospice division. National Church Residences owns Water's Edge of Bradenton.

“I'm looking forward to the move and meeting the residents, staff and people,” Smith says in the release. “And I'm looking forward to experiencing the hospitality of the south.”

The expansion project at Water's Edge, scheduled for completion by next spring, will add 80 units to the complex in a three-story, 77,589-square-foot building. The building will feature a floor dedicated to memory care, the release states. Water's Edge of Bradenton is on 37 acres on 32nd Avenue West.