CALAIS, Maine — Members of Washington County’s legislative delegation, Calais city officials and three representatives of the Maine Department of Health and Human Services were among 15 people who met Tuesday for nearly two hours behind closed doors to discuss how to best respond to the recent closure of Calais’ only licensed nursing home.
The meeting held at Washington County Community College follows Portland-based First Atlantic Healthcare’s closure last month of its 52-bed Atlantic Rehabilitation and Nursing Center in Calais. That decision displaced dozens of residents and cost 92 health care workers their jobs.
“What I saw today was a lot of people committed to exploring every option in terms of where we go from here,”said Maine State Senate President Kevin Raye, a Washington County resident, after coming out of the session. “It’s an extremely complex situation, but it’s worth the effort because it’s really important to this community.”
Also participating were state Reps. Joyce Maker and David Burns, both Republicans from Washington County. Also included in the discussion were Calais Mayor Joe Cassidy and City Manager Diane Barnes.
“I knew this process would be complex, and now I realize how complex,” Cassidy said after the meeting. “I think the city will take a look at doing a feasibility study, and I’ll have to work with the city council in determining how we would cover those costs.”
DHHS sent three representatives to the meeting, including Kenneth Albert, director of the department’s Division of Licensing & Regulatory Services. Also attending the meeting by phone were rural development specialists from the the U.S. Department of Agriculture, who discussed low-interest loan programs.
“I was impressed by the level of commitment from local officials to ensure that there is a nursing facility presence in this community,” Albert said. “I think we were able to provide them with a good appreciation of the complexities of running a nursing facility.”
Albert said DHHS will continue to offer technical assistance to the effort of exploring next steps, as requested.
“This process is about narrowing down the opportunities for the community, which is always a good thing,” he said.
The closure of Atlantic Rehab caught the Calais community by surprise. First Atlantic’s certificate of need application for a new nursing home in Ellsworth — located 90 miles southwest of Calais — included mention of its plans to mothball its 39-year-old facility in Calais. That application was approved by DHHS regulators last fall, but didn’t become common knowledge in Calais until late January 2012. That news left Atlantic Rehab residents and their families perplexed by the uncertainty of the timing of the closure and the reality of a chronic scarcity of nursing home vacancies throughout Washington County.
The city of Calais appealed the certificate of need approval, but that appeal was unsuccessful. The last of dozens of Atlantic Rehab residents who had to relocate left the facility on June 29, a week before a July 6 deadline.
First Atlantic CEO Kenneth Bowden said in April that the decision to close Atlantic Rehab was financial, with expenses far exceeding revenues. At some point, he also suggested that the property be acquired by the city or some other nonprofit entity because that would allow for higher levels of state reimbursement for resident care.
Cassidy said Tuesday that he sees the next step as exploring partnerships in the effort to bring licensed skilled nursing home care back to Calais.
“I think making this happen will require a partnership, and I think the most likely partner would be Calais Regional Hospital,” Cassidy said. “But we’ve not yet had that discussion.”
Joe,,,read the paper. Headlines. hospital laying people off, going broke…Now what????
River 4 read the paper…”Citing lower patient head counts, reduced levels of reimbursement for services and the recent closure of the city’s only nursing home, hospital officials say the 25-bed facility through the end of May was operating at a $1 million loss this calendar year!”
Who knows partnering with the hospital could be a “win win”! First Atlantic also states that the nursing home was operating at a loss however neglected to state that since January the doors were locked to new admissions and at that time the 52 bed facility had 46 residents and turned away 4 potential admissions within the first week. There has to be a solution, lets pray that our county and city delegates can find it!!!
Now all the politicians are trying to pretend they care and want to help. Only because it is an election year. Yeah they had short notice but you didn’t see anyone kicking and screaming for the people of Calais because they didn’t want to upset Augusta. Now that they did what they did and it cant be undone, they are putting on a good show. Only one caring enough is Joyce and Joe they rest dont care!! Politics at its best!
Give it up. Calais is in economic collapse. Washington County is in economic collapse. Maine is in economic collapse. Time to move out and move on to another state. There will only be very poor fools left in Calais. The DEAD ZONE has arrived.
Joe Cassidy is partly right in calling for a partnership with the hospital. There needs to be a partnership with the rest of the comminities in the geographic draw area. Baileyville, Alexander Robinston, Charlotte, Perry, Cooper, Crawford, Princeton, Grand Lake Stream, Indian twp., Waite, Talmage, Topsfield, Lambert Lake, Vanceboro, Danforth, etc. Most of these towns have had residents in the Calais Nursing home and come to Calais on a fairly regular basis to do their shopping. I would think that a small increase in property tax would cover the costs. It should be shared by all the towns.
If we could get the hospital to go along with a wing dedicated to long term nursing with a connecting door, the savings in ambulance fees would probably pay for the construction in 10 years time.
Let First Atlantic keep their leaking mold infested building and pay taxes on it. The city should not buy this property as it would cost them the price of demolition then a total rebuild. Better to swing a deal with the hospital.