An information night held early this month at the Blind Foundation Hall in Oamaru drew 63 people interested in the up to 50 positions, she said.
"We have had quite a significant response," Mrs Dwyer said.
"We’ve had a lot of interest in the positions and we have been receiving a lot of applications. It’s going to be a big job to sort through them all."
The construction of the retirement village was due to be completed on July 31, residents moving into the new facility over August.
Mrs Dwyer said she was confident there would be "full occupancy" of the retirement village when it opened. It would be necessary to fill the positions of clinical manager, registered nurses, caregivers and a host of other roles by that time.
She was confident the positions would be filled.
"I don’t have room [jobs] for everybody and I feel bad about that," she said yesterday.
But if a proposed expansion of another 40 care-centre beds went ahead, another round of hiring would be required for "the same number of caregivers and registered nurses" in about a year.
Mrs Dwyer, who is at present the manager of Rendell on Reed, a rest-home in Reed St, said there was no guarantee the 50 existing staff at Rendell on Reed would be able to secure jobs at the new retirement village, but she had encouraged staff there to apply and had had a "good response".
When the owner of Rendell on Reed decided to walk away from the business late last year, a company called Reed Street Healthcare Ltd was created by the Observatory Village Trust, set up by council-owned Waitaki District Health Services, to take over the management of the Reed St rest-home until August to ensure residents would not have to leave town before the new retirement village was completed. Waitaki deputy mayor Melanie Tavendale yesterday said it was "really encouraging for the town to see any growth in jobs".
"This has been a two-fold positive thing for town — we’ve got job creation but we’ve also got increased services being offered and obviously the proceeds, or profits, from that will go back into health care as well. It’s a bit of a win-win situation."
