Teamwork: Former Tongala Aged Care director of nursing manager Jean Courtney and Sarah Tee.
Sarah Tee will end her 28-year association with the Tongala and District Memorial Aged Care Service after several years of declining finances and increasing compliance requirements, which have created challenges for the organisation.
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She will walk away with the knowledge that the 60 residents and 90 staff have a secure future, with the Respect Aged Care group agreeing to accept responsibility for operating and managing the facility.
The director of nursing manager said ever since the 2012 collapse of the Banksia Group the home had struggled financially and stayed open only due to the hard work and support of a lot of people.
Final months: Long-serving Tongala Aged Care director of nursing Sarah Tee will retire early next year.
“We’ve probably had conversations about the future of the aged care home for several years, but more seriously in the last couple,” she said.
Ms Tee flagged her intention to retire in February last year, but agreed to stay on until a replacement could be found. COVID-19 conditions complicated the running of the facility, with the recommendations of the Royal Commission into Aged Care Quality and Safety following soon after.
“There was increased compliance requirements in almost every area and they couldn’t find a replacement,” she said.
“The committee seriously started to contemplate its future at the start of 2021.”
There were five parties interested in having Tongala Aged Care join their organisation. Two parties withdrew their interest and another was not considered a viable option in the short term. A process of due diligence was undertaken by Tongala before finally recommending Respect to the members of the association.
The life governors and members of the aged care association attended a special meeting last Wednesday, and voted to adopt the committee’s recommendations to transfer its operations and assets to Respect.
“Respect has done months of research into this decision,” Ms Tee said.
“They run other rural aged care facilities, including at Swan Hill and Cohuna.”
Ms Tee said occupancy at the home had not been at 100 per cent for some time, operating more at the 80 per cent level for the 70-bed facility.
“It’s a bare bones operation,” she said.
“We need to be operating at 100 per cent to be financial — even that is tough.”
Ms Tee said government regulations had made it difficult for community-owned facilities such as Tongala to continue operating, with COVID requirements adding further complications.
“Masks, sign-in procedures, managing visitors — all are things that have made running a facility like this very difficult during COVID,” she said.
“It is a credit to the residents, their family, staff and visitors that everyone has remained virus-free to date.
“I understand that rules need to be in place, but it has been very difficult to tick all the boxes.
“Respect is a much larger operation and has people who specialise in things we have outsourced.”
The history of the home is strong and it will be kept intact by Respect, which is a Tasmanian-based organisation that has recently stepped in to secure the future of a couple of regional Victorian facilities.
“Tongala aged care has been around for 95 years,” Ms Tee said.
“It has a great deal of history and I am happy the current and future residents will have a home, and 90 staff will continue to have work.”
Respect is an experienced not-for-profit aged care provider with numerous aged care homes and retirement living communities across rural and regional Victoria, NSW and Tasmania.
