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Magazine: Medford's a good spot to retire Nice weather, good medical care help sway Money By GREG STILES Mail Tribune Medford's not-so-well-kept secret has gone national. It's been more than 40 years since the Rogue Valley Manor began operation, and in the decades since, retirees have flocked to Southern Oregon, participating in active senior living in a comfortable climate with good medical care close at hand. Money Magazine's annual list of Best Places to Retire was released Monday, and Medford was on the list of eight destinations to spend the golden years. Medford joined Providence, R.I., Sarasota, Fla., Roanoke, Va., Sheboygan, Wis., Boulder, Colo., Las Cruces, N.M., and San Miguel de Allende, Mexico, on the AOL Time-Warner Co. magazine's list for 2002. The list appears in the June issue, which will be available next week, a company spokes-man said. "Sometimes it doesn't take a city's changing for us to pick it," said Money reporter Andrea Bennett, who has been a member of the selection team the past two years. "Our criteria can be scientific to an extent, running numbers, the prices of single-family houses compared to other cities, and so forth. But we try to find a group of people who love where they live. "Last year we chose Eugene, because it had miles and miles and miles of trails. For some reason, we kept hearing about Medford this year and decided to take a closer look." In a story about Medford, the magazine focused on a retired Chicago couple, Harold and Doris Dee, who live not in Medford but on 11 acres along the Rogue River outside of Gold Hill. The story compares the Windy City's bitter winters and humid summers to the mild climes of Medford, with 88-degree average highs in July and 28-degree average lows in December. The story mentions Medford's distance from Portland but notes its proximity to the Oregon Shakespeare Festival and Britt Music Festivals. "Roughly midway between San Francisco and Seattle, Medford lies just north of the California border, surrounded by the Siskiyou and the Cascade mountains," Money reports. "The Pacific is about a two-hour drive west, but with all the rivers and lakes in the vicinity, you don't need to go that far for amazing fishing, boating or river rafting. There are five golf courses and several wineries near Medford, and the old-growth forests of Crater Lake National Park are only an hour away." "What I hear from seniors moving here from California and other places is that weather is one of the biggest reasons," Dan McFarland, general manager of Anna Maria Creekside retirement home in Medford. "I hear cultural opportunities and third is the medical community with a fantastic reputation." Seniors moving into the valley have been a boon to retail and service sectors. "The large numbers drive the services they can find in the valley as opposed to the places more geared for the baby-boom populous," said McFarland, who read a report naming the Rogue Valley as the 11th most popular place for retirees a couple of years ago. "I was talking to some Realtors about their typical clientele and typically they see people here who have had first and second careers and are close to retirement age or are outright ready to retire." Reach reporter Greg Stiles at 776-4463 or e-mail [email protected] . Mail Tribune Home | Ottaway Newspapers, Inc. | Dow Jones & Co., Inc. | Privacy | Contact Us Copyright � 2001 Mail Tribune, Inc.