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LAUREL – More than 80 from the public and 15 staff members from Hillcrest Care Center met last week to issue a fervent call to action.
During the two-hour meeting, the audience and staff spoke passionately and at times clapping when discussing next steps amidst the center’s financial woes in the hopes of saving the city-owned nursing home and assisted living facility.
Staff described how they are harassed by collection agencies and have limited supplies on hand due to the non-payment of vendors, blaming financial issues on mismanagement and lack of communication by the facility administrator, city council and mayor.
“We have tried to work with the council and they’ve ignored us,” said Wendy Krei, a registered nurse at Hillcrest. “We really didn’t have a choice but to try to come to you guys and we need your support or we aren’t going to have a nursing home anymore.”
How we got here
Staff said they brought their concerns to the seven-member Hillcrest advisory board about two years ago. In turn, the board started questioning the administrator, council and mayor.
“We saw what was going on with our financials and it was scary. We brought it up ... we never got an answer,” said Kathy Bradford, a former member of Hillcrest’s advisory board.
Bradford said the facility administrator didn’t like the nursing board “telling her what to do,” and that’s why the board was dissolved.
When asked Monday by the Advocate, City Attorney Keelan Holloway provided the city ordinance that dissolved the nursing home advisory board, signed in May 2024. The new ordinance repealed older ordinances establishing the board that dated back to 1989. The new ordinance states the mayor and city council members oversee the operations, governance and administration of Hillcrest and the facility.
Without an advisory board to voice concerns, staff went to a city council member. Instead of helping, city council members met with the facility administrator independently and employees were reprimanded for speaking out, Krei said.
“We don’t get to talk to anybody. We don’t get to go above the administration,” Krei said. “From there, things progressed and got a lot worse.”
Not feeling heard, staff posted signs around Laurel and used social media to alert the public, with a headline in capital letters, SAVE HILLCREST CARE CENTER. That move led to more than 60 people attending the Jan. 13 council meeting.
The city responded, saying the fliers gave an inaccurate message the center is closing and the inaccurate impression the facility is not equipped to care for its residents.
A document circulated by Hillcrest staff detailed the city-owned facility’s financial obligations swelling year over year to now more than $450,000 in accounts deemed open payables — in other words, unpaid bills.
The bills continue to go unpaid despite an increasing line of credit to its current $500,000 — provided by Security Bank, where Mayor Keith Knudsen is the president.
The city said the document circulated at the council meeting doesn’t give the full financial picture and didn’t include accounts receivable information. Instead, the city said Hillcrest’s working capital deficit is $66,385.
“We don’t have any working capital,” said Marsha Meier, business manager at Hillcrest. “We have none and it’s kind of scary because we have a lot of outstanding bills, but our revenue doesn’t cover it.”
She said the facility administrator decides which vendors are paid and which are not, sometimes using a “floating check” in which a check is written without having funds but expecting them before the check is cleared or even mailed.
In a press release issued last week, the city pointed out voters opposed a sales tax increase at the polls last year that would’ve generated upwards of $110,000 in additional annual support for the center.
Meier said history shows throwing more money at the situation won’t change anything.
“If we don’t do something (different), I don’t know how it’s going to turn around,” Meier said.
A call to action
Brittany Heinrich, a Hillcrest nurse undergoing nursing home administrator courses, presented a plan to get the center viable again.
“You have one of the best nursing homes I’ve ever worked at,” she said. “I could easily go find a job somewhere else that would probably pay the same and be closer to where I live. I don’t want it. I want to be here. I want to save this nursing home.”
To be financially stable, the center’s census needs to be 28-30, she said.
“We cannot make it on 20,” Henrich said. The facility contains 36 beds in its nursing home and seven assisted living apartments. As of last week, five of the seven assisted living apartments were occupied and 19 of the 36 nursing home beds.
The center has stayed steady at a census around 20 for the last two years and cared for even fewer residents during the COVID epidemic, about 12.
She said Hillcrest isn’t getting many referrals due to a bad reputation. Overcoming this will take time, but the center’s marketing director needs to make a more concentrated effort on building relationships with referring hospitals and senior citizens in the area.
“We need some tires on the road,” Bradford agreed.
More work needs to be done to verify funds and insurance status before accepting incoming residents as the center has some issues with nonpayment of services in the past.
“We need somebody that makes a devoted job to recoup our lost costs,” Bradford said. “Our nursing home has written off hundreds of thousands of dollars people have not paid. There’s something different we can do about that.”
The budget needs to be broken down by department so that managers know how much they can spend on supplies, she said.
The center also can’t continue to afford outsourcing staff recruitment and part of its Minimum Data Set (MDS) assessment process, Heinrich said.
Ultimately, the staff would like to work under a different administrator and bring back a nursing home advisory board.
“We want our nursing home board back. We felt they were there to advocate for us. When that was dissolved it really wasn’t fair to us. .... And we need them to keep the facility management in check,” Heinrich said.
A third-party auditor, separate from the city’s firm, was also suggested.
Krei would like to pursue certifying Hillcrest as a veteran’s home.
At the end of the meeting, former nursing home advisory board members Bradford, Marilyn Abts and Karen Granquist agreed to form a committee, and consult with an attorney about a potential petition.
“We are willing to sit and talk with the city council about strategies,” said Laura Schoen, another Hillcrest nurse. “They’re not listening to us. They’re not responding to us. This is a community-owned building. Your tax money is going to this building. Your loved ones are in this building. You have a right to know what’s going on, and you have a right to have a good facility in your neighborhood, too.”
The audience was encouraged to contact city council members - Chris Hartung, June Koester, Jeff Erwin and Justin Eriksen - to voice concerns.
Nothing will be resolved until there’s change, said Scott Rath, former Laurel mayor who attended the meeting last week.
“Our council can make the change. Not the mayor,” he said.
“The council sets policies and rules; the mayor carries them out. But for some reason, the direction is always coming through the mayor and the council’s been following the mayor’s recommendations. I don’t know if it’s been the best road to travel. We need to do something for our nursing home. We need to do something for our residents. We need to do something for our community. I think we need to stand up and get it done.”
Krei said another meeting will be set — likely next week — to update the public on any progress and continue discussions.
The Laurel Advocate reached out to Mayor Knudsen and City Attorney Holloway, asking specific questions and for any additional comment. Outside of providing the city ordinance that dissolved the nursing home board, no other information was provided by press time.
The city has not set any further public meetings regarding Hillcrest.
