An Elkhart nursing home that St. Joseph County commissioners are offering as a potential next home for soon-to-be-displaced Portage Manor residents has a history of health and safety violations.
Valley View Healthcare Center on Mishawaka Road, owned by Cincinnati-based CommuniCare Health Services, has been cited by federal inspectors for 57 violations and fined more than $144,000 over the past three years, according to a database by journalism outlet ProPublica.
County Council Member Diana Hess said she’s also leery about a lawsuit that’s been filed against CommuniCare for allegedly mistreating nurses at its nursing homes in other states. That lawsuit, filed in Ohio federal court, claims CommuniCare recruited nurses from the Phillipines, failed to pay them for overtime, and threated to sue them if they quit without paying the company $16,000 for what it called immigration and recruitment costs.
“So I have lots of questions about that particular facility and the fact that’s been discussed,” Hess said. “Moving residents from Portage Manor into a long-term care facility was not a solution to keep the community of people together.
“There seems to be a complete misunderstanding of the residents who live at Portage Manor, what their needs are, what the community means to them, how important this is. It’s like ripping people apart. These are not people who should be warehoused. These are people who have lives and feelings and concerns and families who care.”
To the annoyance of Portage Manor residents’ family members, Commissioner President Carl Baxmeyer declined to identify the nursing home last week when he and commissioner Derek Dieter announced they’d stick to their decision to close Portage Manor. But Dieter this week confirmed with WVPE that it’s Valley View. He said he didn’t know enough about Valley View’s violations to comment on them.
Valley View’s administrator, David Henke, did not return a call from WVPE seeking comment for this story. Henke is also a Republican Elkhart Common Council member.
St. Joseph County Council member Amy Drake didn’t mention Valley View’s violations at Tuesday night’s council meeting, when she defended efforts by Republicans on the council to find a new home there for Portage Manor residents.
“Just last week we heard about the option of this possible facility in Elkhart,” Drake said. “For all of us, I think we felt a surge of relief. They had closed a wing during COVID and wanted to reopen it for the Portage Manor residents, and they were excited about it. They were trying to come up with ideas to get the Portage Manor residents enthusiastic. It was really nice to see. It was sincere. There are a lot of people who have sincerely worked hard. The people up here who you think don’t care, we do care.”
But Hess said Portage Manor residents don’t belong in any nursing home, regardless of violations of regulations or the law. Most need mental health care.
Julie Calhoun agrees. Her 55-year-old brother, Randy “Joe” Nowak, has schizophrenia and has lived in Portage Manor for 30 years.
“They act like everybody is magically going to be accepted but everybody’s diagnosis is different,” Calhoun said. “It varies. All the residents, I think, have some form of mental illness. That’s why it’s so important for them to keep that facility open. It’s a gem. I mean I’ve said it over and over. There’s nothing like it.”
But in a press release they issued Wednesday, commissioners said there’s nothing like it for a reason. Most Portage Manor residents live on a state benefit called the Residential Care Assistance Program, or “RCAP.” But the state hasn’t increased RCAP funding for 15 years, driving most of Indiana’s 92 counties to close their county homes over the years, according to the release. There are just 10 county homes left, soon to be nine after one closes in Delphi. More than half of the state’s RCAP recipients live at Portage Manor.
Commissioners have ordered Portage Manor closed by July 31. Valley View, with room for about 50 new patients once that wing reopens, reportedly is applying with the state to become an RCAP-licensed facility.
