PORT TOWNSEND – At 96, legally blind and nearly deaf, Luella Campbell had every expectation of living her final days in the Victoria House assisted living center.
Her son, Doug Campbell of Port Townsend, expected to continue visiting her in the senior living community of 39 units on Discovery Road.
“The doctor told me I should put her in a place where she wouldn’t be moved again,” he said, remembering when he placed his mother there in February 2006.
“So it was paramount that I not move her again.”
He said that the facility’s former director assured him that Medicaid would pay for his mother’s care if her own money ran out.
That was before the assisted living center’s most recent residence director, Wayne Pattison, got the word on Nov. 1 that the Milwaukee-based parent company Assisted Living Concepts Inc., would no longer honor Medicaid for nine residents, including Luella Campbell.
Only private pay residents are to be accepted after that date.
The company’s action at Victoria House does not affect Medicaid-covered residents at Assisted Living Concept’s Prairie Springs center in Sequim or Laurel Park in Port Angeles, said Laurie Bebo, company president.
Pattison cited the Washington Center for Assisted Living’s written position that the state “shortchanges assisted living care” when it comes to Medicaid.
“There’s nothing personal with this,” he said. “This is just business.”
Doug Campbell said it’s an extremely personal business.
He watched painfully as his mother’s $70,000 life savings dwindled in 18 months, while she paid nearly $4,000 each month for her care.
Threatened with the possibility of eviction, she had to seek Medicaid.
Her son vehemently opposes moving the residents in their twilight years, especially his mother.
“I am concerned it will be too much of a shock for her,” Doug Campbell said.
He also doesn’t want his mother moved hundreds of mile away to a company facility in Kelso, about 200 miles south of Port Townsend.
“I check in with her at least three times a week, but I can’t do that if it’s in Kelso,” said Campbell, a Tacoma native who has lived in Port Townsend since 2000.
“It might as well be on the moon some place.”
Campbell plans to contact Rep. Kevin Van De Wege, D-Sequim, this week to seek legislative help for people like his mother.
Campbell and others in Port Townsend are planning a 1 p.m. Saturday protest in front of Victoria House.
