Pictures hanging in a hallway at Sarnia’s Vision Nursing Home form a timeline of the history of its owner, Vision ’74, a local non-profit celebrating its 50th anniversary Saturday with an open house.
Pictures hanging in a hallway at Sarnia’s Vision Nursing Home form a timeline of the history of its owner, Vision ’74, a local non-profit celebrating its 50th anniversary Saturday with an open house.
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“This is our story,” chief executive Heather Martin said of the images of each expansion since the 1970s.
Today, the charity runs the expanded nursing home, along with Vision Rest Home and The Wellington Flats apartments, on a Brock Street site that has grown since the group incorporated in 1974 as a charitable company aimed at supporting Christian education.
After buying its first property, the charity almost immediately began building a nursing home, Martin said.
“The funniest part of the minutes is the board decided to do this, wrote a letter to the minister of health, sent a $10 check and got approved to build a nursing home,” she said.
“It takes a lot of fortitude to get through that process now.”
The rest home, for seniors not requiring nursing care, came next in 1982 followed by a three-storey nursing home addition in 2001 and a two-storey nursing home addition in 2013.
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“It’s a wonderful organization,” said Martin, who began working at Vision in 1988. “It has been my pleasure to be part of it.”
In 2012, Vision ’74 added a clinic for a nurse practitioner practice, which left for a larger location in 2018. The space became Vision’s corporate offices.
The Wellington Flats apartment building, including affordable units, opened in 2019.
“It has been quite a journey,” Martin said.
Vision is setting up tents on the site Saturday for a 50th anniversary public open house from 1:30 to 3:30 pm, featuring live music, a balloon artist, and unveiling of a commemorative plaque.
Martin said Vision wants to thank the community “for supporting us over the 50 years, and hopefully we’ll continue to be a part of this community for many more years to come.”
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Today, there are 146 long-term care beds at Vision, along with the small, “boutique” retirement home, Martin said.
As well as 24 retirement home beds, the rest home provides 10 transitional beds for people who can be discharged from hospital, “but still need a safe and supportive environment,” she said.
The long-term care sector has been “growing in leaps and bounds,” in Ontario, because of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and other factors, leading the provincial government to increase staff levels “to where we always knew we needed to be,” she said.
In 2019, Vision had 225 employees; today, there are 340.
As a charitable organization, Vision feels pride and gratitude “to be part of our community,” Martin said.
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“We have committed ourselves to this community to do good and to bring services to the senior population,” she said. “After 50 years, we haven’t wavered from that.”
As a charity, Vision is able to support community organizations, including Christian education, food banks and others, “which is another piece of what makes us a remarkable company,” Martin said.
Vision sees affordable supportive housing as “the next really big need in our community,” she said.
Martin is part of a group of local Rotary Club members involved in efforts to create more affordable housing in the Sarnia area and “we hope we can bring some more good to the community that way.”
Wellington Flats opened with space for 36 residents, but “it would have been ideal if we had built it bigger,” she said.
“The wait list for all our services is extensive.”
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