Charleswood seniors shocked, scrambling for homes after learning their assisted living facility is closing
CBC
More than a dozen seniors and their families say they feel blindsided after learning a west Winnipeg assisted living facility plans to shut down in three months.
The Assiniboine Links, in the historic Odd Fellows Home at 4025 Roblin Blvd., has been sold and the new owner plans to convert it to rental apartments, residents have been told. The facility is expected to close by the end of August.
"It was totally devastating," said 72-year-old Barry Robertson, who has lived at the Charleswood facility for about a year.
"We had it good here … and then all of a sudden on Sunday they came around with papers saying that we have to move out in three months."
While residents and family members search for new accommodations, the acting manager at the facility blames a decision by a provincial municipal board that quashed a planned apartment complex on the property.
Revenue from that complex would have saved the facility, said Alan Nixon, president of the volunteer board that runs Assiniboine Links and a member of the Odd Fellows, a Catholic fraternal group that currently holds title on the property.
It has struggled to find tenants since the COVID-19 pandemic, said Nixon, who was appointed as acting manager after the board dismissed the facility's manager in order to save money.
Assiniboine Links currently has 17 residents — fewer than the 22 Nixon said it needs to be viable.
The building was sold last year to the same developer who had planned to build a 199-unit apartment complex next to it.
The City of Winnipeg approved that project, but the Manitoba Municipal Board — a board of provincial appointees that was given expanded powers in 2021, allowing it to reverse Winnipeg city council decisions on a variety of land-use decisions — overruled the city's approval after nearby residents complained.
"If the apartment had gone ahead, we wouldn't be having this conversation," Nixon said.
Revenue from the apartment complex would have covered the costs of running the assisted living facility, but without it, Assiniboine Links is no longer viable, he said.
Staff are trying to help families find alternative accommodations, said Nixon, who has been involved with the facility since 2009.
"It hurts us just as much as it hurts them to tell them that they have to move."