By Tara de Ryk
March 1, 2010

DAVIDSON-The future of the housing units at Davidson and District Health Centre will be up for discussion when the board of Heartland Regional Health Authority meets next week.

Greg Cummings, CEO of Heartland Regional Health, said he is seeking the board's guidance on what to do with housing units it inherited when the region was formed. Health care facilities in Davidson, Outlook and Eston came to the region with affordable housing units that were built by the communities in the 1960s and 1970s.

Citing rising upkeep costs and restraints on capital dollars, Heartland Regional Health Authority has been operating under the direction that it should get out of the housing business.

While health care costs continue to escalate by about 9 to 10 per cent a year, Cummings said the provincial government has forewarned health regions to expect no more than a 3 per cent increase in health spending in the provincial budget.

Meanwhile, he said rent charged on the units in Davidson, Outlook and Eston is not enough to offset their costs of upkeep.
Cummings said the units in Davidson need new furnaces and roofs.

Known locally as the Arm River Housing units, the units up for discussion by the health region are the three duplexes located on the health centre grounds. One duplex has four self-contained bachelor suites. The other two duplexes have a total of six one-bedroom, self-contained units.

Residents of the units pay a straight monthly rent. The units were rented on a first come, first serve basis and occupancy was not contingent on health care needs.

The units are used by the community as a form of affordable housing, inhabited mostly by seniors. Some residents live independently while others receive assistance from home care services for some of their personal needs.

Because of their proximity to the health centre, the units also offer residents access to personal care services in the health centre offered by home care such as tub baths. Residents of the units may also purchase and take their meals at the health centre.

Cummings said as health care funding gets tighter, the health region is focusing on health needs and while housing as it relates to long-term care, is part of the overall health care picture, the type of health care facilities the region operates are for people who require nursing care 24 hours, seven days a week.

Up until now, the health region has been operating under the direction that as units in Davidson and the other communities are vacated they are not to take new tenants. Currently, eight of the 10 units are occupied.

"The reason the health region has tentatively gone down the road of not occupying them if they become vacant is the amount of revenue from the rent is far less than the cost to equip and maintain the units," Cummings said.

"We'll be a lot more clear about what we're going to do after the next board meeting."

Cummings said he will work with staff and the board to either affirm the direction of divesting of the units or come up with a new strategy to operate the units or dispose of them.

"We should and will discuss the disposition of those units in the future," he said.

By disposition he referred to working with the communities about who could possibly take them over and operate them.

Davidson Mayor Mary Jane Morrison said affordable housing is needed in Davidson by people of all ages and said the town would look at options that were affordable and could work into a long-term sustainable housing option.

"We need to meet the needs of the community. Whether it's done with a community group or a private enterprise, the community would work together to make that happen," she said.

While at the recent Saskatchewan Urban Municipalities Association convention, Morrison said one topic of concern for many municipalities was the need for more types of assisted living situations for people. These types of facilities would be considered Level 1 and Level 2.

According to Saskatchewan Health Level 2 personal care is for persons who require supervision and assistance with personal hygiene and grooming. They may move around safely with or without mechanical aids and may require some supervision and direction for minor behavioural problems.

That covers most of the people who currently reside in the health centre.

The Arm River Housing Units were opened in 1966 in conjunction with the construction and opening of Prairie View Lodge.

The lodge and units were built by Arm River Housing Corporation, a non-profit community organization that was jointly sponsored by the rural municipalities of McCraney, Arm River and Willner, the villages of Bladworth and Girvin and the Town of Davidson.

It cost $352,520 to build the lodge and units. The project was largely financed by $22,000 from the sponsoring municipalities, a $70,504 grant from the province and a $229,000 loan from CMHC. The Davidson Union Hospital Board donated a parcel of land and Arm River Farms donated four acres north of the hospital.

Arm River Housing Corporation's mission was to fill a community need regarding housing and living conditions for Davidson and district's senior citizens.
Prairie View Lodge, which now forms part of the long-term care wings of Davidson's health centre, and the adjacent duplexes were built to provide affordable housing and assisted living conditions.

Arm River Housing Corporation's first and long-time chairman Elmer Laird is now a resident of those housing units.

Arm River Housing Corporation was responsible for the lodge and units until the early 1990s when the province restructured health care, removing control of the local hospital, lodge and housing units from the local health boards to a regional system, first under Midwest District Health and then to a larger area under Heartland Regional Health Authority.

The possibility of the Arm River Housing units being closed to new tenants worries Donna Siroski, chairwoman of Davidson Housing Authority.

"We've got a waiting list and the town needs those suites too," she said of the units at the health centre.

Currently Davidson Housing Authority has four to five people on a list waiting for housing and that includes housing authority's units at Northside Manor.

Many of the people residing in the Saskatchewan Housing Authority's units in Davidson are seniors, however, Siroski said people do not have to be over the age of 65 to reside in a unit. The housing is subsidized and residents pay according to income.

Siroski said more affordable housing is needed in Davidson and views the units at the health centre as ideally located and ones that should function as transition suites from Saskatchewan Housing's units to the health centre.

The need for affordable, assisted living for senior citizens has ben acknowledged by the provincial government.

The first goal listed in Saskatchewan Health's Provincial Policy Framework and Action Plan for Older Persons of May 2003 was to "ensure provision of and access to affordable and supportive housing and services for older persons." In that same action plan, it was noted that the Provincial Advisory Committee for the International Year of Older Persons identified a common concern among seniors and their organizations "as the availability and affordability of housing which meets the particular needs of older persons".

The leaderonline is a division of The Davidson Leader, Davidson, Saskatchewan, Canada.