Redevelopment plans for Grey Gables long-term care home in Markdale are on hold indefinitely.
County council passed a motion in a 50-40 weighted vote at a special meeting on Aug. 26 to proceed with the redevelopment of Rockwood Terrace long-term care home in Durham but suspend the redevelopment of Grey Gables until such time county council decides otherwise.
The recorded vote saw Owen Sound Mayor Ian Boddy, Owen Sound Deputy Mayor Brian O’Leary, Georgian Bluffs Mayor Dwight Burley, Georgian Bluffs Deputy Mayor Sue Carleton, Hanover Mayor Sue Paterson, Hanover Deputy Mayor Selwyn Hicks, Southgate Mayor John Woodbury, Southgate Deputy Mayor Brian Milne, Meaford Mayor Barb Clumpus and Grey Highlands Deputy Mayor Aakash Desai support the motion to suspend Grey Gables’ redevelopment plans.
Chatsworth Mayor Scott Mackey, Chatsworth Deputy Mayor Brian Gamble, Blue Mountains Mayor Alar Soever, Blue Mountains Deputy Mayor Rob Potter, West Grey Mayor Christine Robinson, West Grey Deputy Mayor Tom Hutchinson, Meaford Deputy Mayor Shirley Keaveney and Grey Highlands Mayor Paul McQueen opposed it.
The motion was brought forward by O’Leary after county council received a report at a meeting in early August showing a staggering increase in anticipated costs in the two long-term care builds planned in Markdale and Durham, up 42 per cent from previous estimates to over $108-million (or about $400,000 per bed).
“This is about living within our means. This is just too much money at one time,” O’Leary says. “And we don’t have to do Grey Gables.”
Rockwood Terrace in Durham must be redeveloped to meet ‘Class A’ standards in accordance with the Ontario Long Term Care Homes Act by 2025. Grey Gables in Markdale is not in the same licensing situation requiring redevelopment to meet provincial regulations.
Mackey, who voted against the motion to pause the Grey Gables redevelopment, expressed concerns about the county losing the beds if the project is put on hold.
“I recognize there’s a cost, but I think if we don’t go ahead with this rebuild the future financial and human cost will be much higher,” Mackey explains.
Grey County received approval from the Ontario government in Nov. 2020 for the development of 62 new long-term care beds at Grey Gables, and 66 redeveloped beds for a new 128-bed long-term care facility in Markdale.
In 2019, the provincial government approved the county’s application for 28 new and 100 redeveloped beds for Rockwood Terrace in Durham.
Grey County CAO Kim Wingrove told county councillors the provincial government has indicated an extension to the completion date for the Grey Gables project would be acceptable.
The long term corporate capital overview report prepared by Grey County’s director of finance Mary Lou Spicer also explains the county has a debt management policy to limit annual repayment amounts to 10 per cent of its own source revenue, and pursuing both long-term care redevelopments as well as other spending already planned in the 10-year capital forecast would leave the county within $1.79-million of its internal debt repayment limit policy.
Desai says he has always been in favour of keep Grey Gables as a publicly owned entity, but has concerns about the cost tied to its redevelopment.
“The problem with the cost of borrowing is that it is still borrowing and it is placing the burden on tomorrow’s generation,” Desai says.
He also spoke about current staffing challenges the county has with its long-term care operations and wondered how Grey would be able to accommodate more beds. Grey County’s Director of Long-Term Care Jennifer Cornell spoke further about this.
She says there is no question that there is a “critical shortage” of workers across the entire health system and long-term care is not excluded from that. She says the leadership team works “everyday” to make sure county-run long-term care facilities are at appropriate staffing levels.
Cornell gave a recent example of one of the homes requiring the executive director and director of care to work the night shift to cover a personal support worker shortage.
“It is a serious and ongoing challenge. We’re very grateful for the resources that we have as municipal operators of long-term care, and even still we find ourselves facing this challenge on a daily basis,” Cornell explains.
Cornell says Grey Gables currently requires 42 PSWs in order to staff a two-week schedule and the county currently has 53 PSWs on the roster, but only 36 are actively working. A 20-bed behavioural support transition unit pilot to be implemented at Grey Gables would require six additional full-time equivalents in order to safely operate it, Cornell says. Grey County received only three external applications for those positions in a recent job posting.
“I think it gives a good sense of the lay of the land across the sector, because the behavioural support transition unit is an exciting opportunity for people to have fully paid-for training as part of their hire. We offer very competitive wages,” Cornell explains. “And even then, we only received three external applicants.”
If the county moved ahead with both long-term care redevelopment projects at Grey Gables (62 new beds) and Rockwood Terrace (28 new beds), Cornell says there would be a minimum of 125 additional workers — at least 60 of them PSWs — needed in order to successfully operate the 90 new beds.
