Cutbacks hit seniors where they live

WASILLA — A decision its board of directors made Thursday means that Wasilla Area Seniors Inc. will no longer offer assisted living services as of Dec. 12.

“We had a very hard decision to make for a very long time,” board vice president John Weaver said Friday.

He said the decision affects the 12 housing units in Knik Manor that house residents that require the kind of around-the-clock care assisted living implies. Eleven of those units are currently full.

In a press release, he explained that Knik Manor was built with loans from the Alaska Housing Finance Corp. AHFC requires WASI to offer the units in the building to both assisted and independently living seniors, and WASI can’t set aside some or all of the units for assisted living seniors exclusively.

“The units are made available in the order that people apply,” Weaver says in the release. “WASI can’t predict how many assisted living residents will need services at any given time, making it difficult to keep staffing levels appropriate to the needs of the residents.”

WASI Executive Director Inga Ling said that she’s hopeful a lot of the residents can find personal care assistants (PCAs) to come to the center and offer the help they need. She said half of the residents appear as if they will do just that. Residents who can’t will likely move out.

Jeanine Sparks’ 92-year-old mother lives in an assisted living apartment in Knik Manor. She said that the announcement that WASI was shutting the program down in 90 days was very poorly handled.

“We didn’t know what the meeting was about and it was very abrupt and very rude,” Sparks said.

In addition to the abruptness, she was upset WASI officials didn’t answer questions at the meeting, even though many residents and family members were confused and upset.

She said five months ago when her mother moved in, WASI seemed like a godsend. The facility is five minutes from Sparks’ house. She can visit every day. She’d been seeking a facility for awhile and had called WASI to see if it offered assisted living. Turns out it did and had a spot that could be held open while Sparks got everything in order.

“It was one of those times where things fell together where you just felt like God was involved,” Sparks said.

She said her mother had just started settling in and feeling at home.

“The way this was handled changed my opinion entirely,” Sparks said.

Ling said she understands that people are upset, and she agrees the announcement was abrupt.

“It was definitely not an ideal situation. In an ideal situation, we all would have had a lot more time to ease into it,” she said.

But the board felt a gradual phase-out had the potential to do more harm than good. The fear was that staff wouldn’t stick around if it became clear their jobs were disappearing.

“The board had a decision to make and they realized that this wasn’t something that they could just chew on with everyone worrying about whether they were going to find a job,” Ling said. “We were going to find ourselves in a very difficult situation of not having enough people to take care of the people on the floor.”

As for the complaint that questions weren’t answered at the meeting, Ling said she cut them off early.

“We did have some questions and answers, but because of the climate of the meeting — there was a lot of frustration — and after about 15 minutes I suggested that we go one-on-one,” Ling said.

She said she invited people with questions to seek her out for a conversation.

“I would be more than happy to answer any questions that they may have,” Ling said.

She said the decision was wrenching and a very tough thing to have to stand before a meeting and announce. The assisted living seniors are a tight knit group and they are very close to their care providers. It’s sad and stressful to think the decision will break up that group.

“My stress is nothing compared to what they must be going through having to provide for the long-term care of their loved ones,” Ling said.

She said WASI intends to help residents and employees as much as it can.

Contact reporter Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.