Ford government facing lawsuit over expansion of Pickering care home where dozens died during height of COVID

A health advocacy coalition and the daughter of a deceased long-term-care resident have launched a court challenge against the Ministry of Long-term Care’s approval of the expansion of a Pickering home where the Canadian military reported disturbing conditions during the pandemic.
The challenge announced Tuesday calls for a judicial review of the ministry’s decision to approve an 87-bed expansion of Orchard Villa long-term-care home and a new 30-year licence for its parent company, Southbridge Care Homes.
The home would also redevelop 131 of its 233 existing long-term care beds. 
Orchard Villa was one of five homes that the military entered in April 2020, when it reported inadequate staff training and resident care within the facility. According to the recent court filing, 206 of Orchard Villa’s 233 residents had COVID by spring 2020. During the first wave, 71 residents died at the home.
Orchard Villa continues to face reports of non-compliances under the Fixing Long-Term Care Act, as recently as January.
“I’m at a loss for words as to how this home can be granted a licence to go ahead with a new build,” said Catherine Parkes, whose father died at Orchard Villa almost four years ago.
In an email statement, the ministry said the proposed Orchard Villa project had to undergo “a rigorous undertaking process” to prove it can meet provincial standards under the Fixing Long-term Care Act.
“All proposed license extensions must undergo a rigorous undertaking process to show they can meet these new high standards, as is the case with the proposed Pickering development,” said the statement, attributed to spokesperson Daniel Strauss.
“Hundreds of people” are currently waiting for care in Pickering, the statement added, noting the province has invested $6.4 billion to build 58,000 new and upgraded long-term-care spaces.
“Our government believes in building Ontario’s long-term-care capacity, not reducing it,” said the email.
A Jan. 18 report from an inspection at Orchard Villa found the home continued to face problems meeting provincial regulations, including minimizing the risk of harm to residents, reporting matters appropriately, ensuring staff use safe transferring and positioning devices and techniques to help residents, among others. 
The Star contacted Orchard Villa by phone and through a contact form on its website, as well as Southbridge by phone and email. Neither responded to a request for comment Tuesday afternoon.
“I acknowledge it was a tough time throughout COVID not only here, but around the world,” said Premier Doug Ford in a separate news conference on Tuesday. “But we’ve corrected those problems and are going to continue improving the processes.”
Ford noted the government has hired more nursing home inspectors and is expanding long-term-care homes to meet growing demand from aging seniors.
“There was a lot of problems with many homes across the province. We corrected those problems. We have more inspectors going in. We’re modernizing all the facilities.”
In January, the ministry launched a 10-person unit to investigate long-term-care homes facing allegations of resident abuse or neglect.
The CEO of a national seniors’ advocacy organization also raised questions about the ministry’s decision.
“I was frankly surprised that Orchard Villa was chosen for investment and expansion based on their problematic history,” said Laura Tamblyn Watts of CanAge, noting the home was highlighted in recent years as one of the homes “where some of the worst outcomes happened.”
“I would like to know more about why they were chosen for a renewal and expansion,” she said. “It is publicly a problematic signal.”
At the same time, she hoped the investment would help transform care in the home. While Tamblyn Watts said Ontario has strong long-term-care laws, the ministry needs to ensure that there are substantive consequences to failures to meet standards — something she said the province’s new investigative unit could potentially help with — as well as investment in staffing.
She added that she’s surprised to see investment in building larger homes when it’s clear that smaller homes tend to provide better quality of care.
“People should feel confident that if their loved ones need to go into care, that this isn’t a place where they’re going to be harmed, this is a place where they’re going to be helped,” she said.
With files from Rob Ferguson