{"id":826709,"date":"2026-07-26T06:37:30","date_gmt":"2026-07-26T06:37:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/826709\/"},"modified":"2026-07-26T06:37:30","modified_gmt":"2026-07-26T06:37:30","slug":"weeks-after-napanee-ltc-centre-grand-opening-veteran-caregivers-feel-compelled-to-speak-out","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/826709\/","title":{"rendered":"Weeks after Napanee LTC centre grand opening, veteran caregivers feel compelled to speak out"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"The entrance to Village Green by\u00a0Omni Quality Living,\u00a0a 128- bed long-term care home located at 21 Drive-In Road in Greater Napanee. Photo by Michelle Dorey Forestell\/Kingstonist.<\/p>\n

Just weeks ago, community leaders, provincial officials, and long-term care executives gathered in the bright atrium of Greater Napanee\u2019s new Village Green Long-Term Care Home to celebrate what they described as a new era in care for local seniors.<\/p>\n

Throughout the ceremony on Tuesday, Jun. 23, 2026<\/a>, one word surfaced again and again: dignity.<\/p>\n

Omni Quality Living President and CEO Raheem Hirji told guests that every detail of the new 128-bed home had been designed with dignity in mind. Ontario Minister of Long-Term Care Natalia Kusendova-Bashta said seniors \u201cdeserve the very best\u201d after a lifetime of building their communities. Hastings\u2014Lennox and Addington Member of Provincial Parliament (MPP) Ric Bresee reminded those gathered that long-term care is meant to be a home, not simply a health-care facility.<\/p>\n

Two weeks later, longtime Village Green staff members stood outside that same building holding picket signs.<\/p>\n

They were not asking for higher wages or better benefits, they said; instead, they were fighting for the same ideals celebrated at the ribbon-cutting ceremony: dignity, compassionate care, and a home where residents come first.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve never done a picket before. This is the first time we\u2019ve ever done one,\u201d Sylvia O\u2019Brien said during an interview with Kingstonist.<\/p>\n

O\u2019Brien, a Personal Support Worker (PSW), and her colleague Sherry MacDonald, a Registered Practical Nurse (RPN), have devoted a combined 84 years to caring for Village Green residents. Both are members of OPSEU, the Ontario Public Service Employees Union.<\/p>\n

Both women said they never expected to find themselves organizing the first public information picket of their careers, but they had reached a point where they felt remaining silent was no longer an option.<\/p>\n

O\u2019Brien said the move to the new home was always expected to come with \u201cgrowing pains,\u201d but she believes Village Green opened before staff were adequately prepared.<\/p>\n

Orientation varied widely. Longtime staff were expected to hit the ground running, with some employees receiving only a few hours of training on the new building and others none at all, according to those picketing. O\u2019Brien also questioned whether some newly hired PSWs had been sufficiently prepared for the demands of long-term care.<\/p>\n

Those concerns stand alongside the province\u2019s own stated priorities. Long-Term Care Minister Kusendova-Bashta, a registered nurse who worked on the front lines of Ontario\u2019s health-care system before entering politics, told attendees at the grand opening that government policy is intended to ensure caregivers have manageable workloads \u201cso that the work is not chaotic and rushed each and every day,\u201d allowing them to build therapeutic relationships with residents. She also emphasized the importance of ensuring long-term care homes are adequately staffed and employees properly trained.<\/p>\n

After the COVID-19 pandemic exposed severe staffing shortages in long-term care, Ontario launched a series of accelerated PSW recruitment and training programs as part of its long-term care staffing plan<\/a>. These included a tuition-free Accelerated PSW Training Program that compressed training from the traditional eight months to about six months, along with paid clinical placements, and later \u201cLearn and Earn\u201d and other accelerated pathways intended to increase the supply of PSWs.<\/p>\n

\"VillageThe Village Green by\u00a0Omni Quality Living\u00a0is a 128- bed long-term care home located at 21 Drive-In Road in Greater Napanee, which officially opened its new facility in June 2026. Photo by Michelle Dorey Forestell\/Kingstonist.<\/p>\n

\u201cSome of [the PSWs] were not prepared to do the job at all,\u201d O\u2019Brien said, explaining that several had completed accelerated PSW training and placements in retirement homes, where residents generally require less hands-on care than those living in long-term care. \u201cThey don\u2019t require the amount of support that our residents do.\u201d<\/p>\n

Throughout their interview with Kingstonist, neither woman criticized wages, benefits, or collective bargaining. Instead, every concern they raised ultimately returned to the residents and the care they believe those residents deserve.<\/p>\n

They described the kitchen running out of food during meal service, residents\u2019 closets sitting empty while laundry service backed up, exhausted staff struggling to keep pace with the demands of a home that nearly doubled in size after relocating from Selby to Napanee, and a workplace where, the women said, they increasingly fear they can no longer provide the level of care residents deserve.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey run out of food for our residents all the time,\u201d O\u2019Brien said. \u201cI worked a particular evening shift, and we ran out of food and ended up feeding the residents peanut butter and jam sandwiches. The meal on the menu was roast beef. It\u2019s not right.\u201d<\/p>\n

Laundry has also become a source of frustration. Caregivers, they said, have resorted to searching through lost-and-found bins for wearable clothing, bringing in clothes from their own homes, and borrowing garments from some residents to clothe others. Family members frequently approach staff to say their mother or father\u2019s closet is empty, they said.<\/p>\n

Both women emphasized that their concerns are not about occasional operational problems, but about what they believe has become a pattern affecting residents\u2019 quality of life.<\/p>\n

O\u2019Brien and MacDonald said they repeatedly raised these concerns with management, but were often simply assured that improvements would be made. They also said complaints submitted through the Ministry of Long-Term Care\u2019s inspection process could take weeks to be acknowledged, leaving front-line caregivers feeling their concerns are not being addressed quickly enough.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is the end of their life,\u201d MacDonald said, referring to the residents she and O\u2019Brien care for. \u201cThis is the part of their life where we should be making it the best we can and giving them the dignity and everything that they deserve. And we\u2019re not able to. We just can\u2019t.\u201d<\/p>\n

She recalled one resident whose situation has stayed with her: a female resident, she said, \u201chad gone weeks without a bath.\u201d MacDonald and another staff member, who was also the resident\u2019s niece, remained after the end of their shift to bathe the woman themselves because she \u201chadn\u2019t had a bath in so long.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ultimately, situations like this convinced the two OPSEU members that remaining silent was no longer an option.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe tried. We tried. We tried,\u201d MacDonald repeated, explaining why they eventually chose to organize a public information picket rather than continuing to raise the issues internally.<\/p>\n

Both women have spent nearly their entire working lives at Village Green. They spoke openly about arriving home in tears after shifts and worrying about residents long after leaving work.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have an emotional connection to these people because we\u2019re human,\u201d MacDonald said.<\/p>\n

O\u2019Brien described the longtime staff who transferred from the Selby home to the new building as \u201cthe ones keeping that boat afloat,\u201d saying many are exhausted but continue showing up because of their commitment to residents.<\/p>\n

Throughout Village Green\u2019s grand opening, speakers repeatedly returned to the same themes: dignity, compassionate care, safety, and home. Those themes, O\u2019Brien and MacDonald said, are the same ideals that motivated them to speak publicly.<\/p>\n

At the ceremony, Hirji told guests that what truly makes a long-term care home is not the building itself but the people inside it: the staff member who learns how a resident takes their coffee, the nurse who notices subtle changes in a resident\u2019s health before anyone else, the recreation staff who reconnect residents with activities they once loved, and the employees who reassure worried family members.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis building gives us the conditions,\u201d he said, \u201cbut people make it a home.\u201d<\/p>\n

The employees interviewed by Kingstonist said they agree. Their concern, they said, is whether those people have been given the staffing, resources, and support necessary to fulfill that promise.<\/p>\n

During the ceremony, Bresee described long-term care as not just a health-care facility, but a real home. \u201cHome means comfort, familiarity, and most importantly safety,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\"\"Left to right: Raheem Hirji, president and CEO of Omni Quality Living; Ontario Minister of Long-Term Care Natalia Kusendova-Bashta; Hastings\u2014Lennox and Addington MPP Ric Bresee; Greater Napanee Mayor Terry Richardson; and Village Green Residents\u2019 Council President Kim Wickens cut the ribbon to officially open the new Village Green on Tuesday, June 23, 2026. Photo by Michelle Dorey Forestell\/Kingstonist.<\/p>\n

Again, the women said they share that vision; they are simply concerned that the resources necessary to make that vision a daily reality are not being provided.<\/p>\n

Another concern had to do with who was \u2014 and was not \u2014 present for the grand opening. O\u2019Brien and MacDonald stressed that they had no problem with celebrating the opening of the new home and that they believe it represents an important investment in long-term care. What disappointed them, they said, was that many longtime staff members were not invited to the official ceremony. They also questioned why so few residents attended.<\/p>\n

Kingstonist observed approximately 20 residents, including members of the Residents\u2019 Council, participating in the event. The women said the Residents\u2019 Council had already been raising concerns about food service and laundry previous to the ceremony, but unresolved issues affecting resident care remained.<\/p>\n

In response to questions from Kingstonist, the Ontario Ministry of Long-Term Care said all licensed homes are required to provide residents with safe, high-quality care and noted that concerns can be reported through its inspection process. The ministry did not directly address the allegations raised by the employees.<\/p>\n

Kingstonist has also provided Omni Quality Living with a detailed list of the employees\u2019 allegations and requested comment. Response had not been received by publication time.<\/p>\n

For O\u2019Brien and MacDonald, however, the issue extends beyond any single allegation. After decades of caring for Village Green residents, they said they spoke publicly because, in their view, residents deserve a home that lives up to the ideals that were celebrated when its doors officially opened.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll we want,\u201d MacDonald said, \u201cis for the residents to be the most important part of our day\u2026 and for them to get the best that we can give them.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The entrance to Village Green by\u00a0Omni Quality Living,\u00a0a 128- bed long-term care home located at 21 Drive-In Road…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":826710,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[49,48,288808,84,5432,392,288809,288810,43113,25066,288811,43116,288812,288813,905,21256,288814,113434,50991,288815,288816,288817,288818,2654,288819,288820,288821,288822,288823],"class_list":["post-826709","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-healthcare","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-complaint-process","tag-health","tag-health-care","tag-healthcare","tag-inadequate-laundry-services","tag-lack-of-food","tag-lennox-and-addington-county","tag-long-term-care","tag-ministry-of-long-term-care","tag-napanee","tag-natalia-kusendova-bashta","tag-omni-quality-living","tag-ontario","tag-ontario-government","tag-personal-support-worker-psw","tag-province-of-ontario","tag-provincial-government","tag-raheem-hirji","tag-registered-practical-nurse-rpn","tag-ric-bresee","tag-selby","tag-seniors","tag-sherry-macdonald","tag-sylvia-obrien","tag-treatment-of-long-term-care-residents","tag-under-resourced-staff","tag-village-green-long-term-care-home"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/826709","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=826709"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/826709\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/826710"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=826709"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=826709"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=826709"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}