Fairwinds Lodge in Sarnia following fire. January 28, 2023. (Photo by Natalia Vega)Fairwinds Lodge in Sarnia following fire. January 28, 2023. (Photo by Natalia Vega)
Sarnia

Frustration grows after Fairwinds fire

A local family impacted by the Fairwinds Lodge fire have reached out to elected officials, detailing their experience.

John's mother-in-law, Geri, was a resident at the retirement home and has been living with him and his wife since the January 15th blaze.

He said the plans put forward by Sienna Senior Living have been confusing and inconsistent when it comes to retrieving her personal belongings from her first floor unit.

His wife Karen said their main job right now is trying to keep the 93-year-old's spirits up.

"She wakes up in the morning and lies there and thinks about everything she lost," said Karen. "Our main problem with mom is she knows her stuff is there. She keeps saying "well when I get my chair back, when I get this back" that's the kind of thing, she thinks about all the things that she has, her art, things like that and she just gets upset about it."

John said staff on the ground have been wonderful, however communication with Sienna Senior Living has been erratic.

"We're trying not to be a pest, I think at times we have been with the number of phone calls," said John. "But it's largely because there's an urgency to this. This stuff is sitting in a unit there. We have a 93-year-old lady who's very upset and she cannot plan her future unless she knows where her stuff is."

In a recent email to Sarnia News Today, Sienna Senior Living stated that the process of reuniting residents with their belongings is underway, and that almost 120 residents have new living accommodations.

"We are working with professional movers who are assisting us with packing and protecting all contents from every suite where access is possible and safe, and returning them to our residents," read the statement.

The company said that since the fire occurred, they have had three main priorities: health and safety, ensuring residents find new accommodations, and retrieving resident belongings.

John said it seems as though the management company never had a plan for an event such as this. He said the seniors and their families have already gone through enough, and don't need to be kept in further suspense over when and where they can retrieve their cherished possessions.

"In order to efficiently and effectively assess what is retrievable, all we have asked for is that residents or their representatives need to accompany the persons designated to oversee the process into the units and then identify what needs to be retrieved," he said. "The folks on the ground here, in the local emergency services, fire department, they had a great plan because they implemented it to get those 120 residents out of there without a scratch, that's amazing. But the follow up part of this, once you're past 'o.k. we're all safe' there's a lot of anxiety for 120 seniors as to what's happening next. They didn't have a plan for that."

The cause of the fire at the 113 room retirement home on  Michigan Avenue was deemed accidental.

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