An assisted living facility has now contacted the police 151 painful times during the time span of four years, sources report.
In the summer of 2022, Maggie Sutton, a social worker and case manager for the Greenfield Fire Department, noticed a pattern.
She observed that paramedics were frequently responding to calls from The Villa of Greenfield, an assisted living facility located just a few minutes away.
Sutton recounted some concerning incidents she was aware of.
In one case, paramedics found a resident who had been lying on the ground for 12 hours, covered in feces and urine.
In another instance, paramedics had to break a window to enter the building because the staff were asleep.
Some of the calls to 911 were from residents who needed help getting out of bed, but Sutton also noticed that many residents were simply isolated and lonely, prompting them to call for assistance.
This pattern of frequent emergency calls from the assisted living facility raised red flags for Sutton, suggesting potential issues with the level of care and supervision provided to the residents.
Sutton’s job is to help people who frequently use emergency services.
Often, that includes residents of assisted living facilities, which are struggling statewide with funding, turnover and residents’ rising medical needs.
As the summer wore on, Sutton saw no signs that conditions inside the mostly Medicaid-funded facility were improving.
Meanwhile, local first responders were getting overwhelmed, per the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.
“I said to them, ‘I’m going to have to start making these reports to the state,'” she said.
Sutton filed two complaints with the Wisconsin Department of Health Services in July, and a third in September.
However, she wasn’t alone: The state received seven other complaints about the facility in 2022, after sorting through 18 others since 2019.
By October 2022, the state had finished its investigation.
The report was 97 pages long.
Sutton often arrived at work in summer 2022 by 8 a.m. to find paramedics waiting at her office door with news about the most recent overnight visit to The Villa of Greenfield.
“They, to some degree, wanted me to see it with my own eyes as well,” said Sutton, a former certified nurse aide, or CNA.
Walking in to the 42-bed facility, Sutton said conditions hit all her senses at once.
She smelled urine, feces and marijuana, saw residents slumped over in wheelchairs, and heard others calling for help without reprieve.
Between 2019 and 2022, records show police made contact with the building 151 times.
Paramedics often times helped.
Over the past two decades, Wisconsin’s assisted living system doubled in size but struggled to keep up with rising resident health issues, according to a recent Journal Sentinel investigation.
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Other Local Wisconsin News Today
A surprising Wisconsin company is now laying off thousands of workers in Fond du Lac, according to a spokesperson.
Approximately 1,700 hourly employees will be affected by ‘short-term layoffs’ at Mercury Marine.
Employees say they were surprised about the announcement and are nervous about the future, per NBC 26.
The affected employees will lose eight weeks of work, broken up into two week increments.
When the company was asked if more layoffs are coming, Mercury said it will “continue to monitor demand.”
The news comes after the company laid off more than 400 employees earlier this year.
A memo to employees obtained by NBC 26 shows that from early July through November, affected hourly workers will each lose eight weeks of work, broken up into two week increments.
Gordon said the 1,700 employees won’t be paid during the short-term layoffs that take place in two-week increments, but they can apply for unemployment.
I spoke with several workers who are going through the layoffs, including a man whose identity we agreed to disguise to protect his job.
“It’s really going to cut into a lot of people with budgets,” the employee said.
“Some friends that I know work there are going to fall behind on child support because they’re not making the money they they would normally be making.”
He said even if he collects unemployment, he’ll only get about half of his paycheck.
He said he’s looking for another job, but is struggling to find one that will pay as much as Mercury and is near Fond du Lac.
“It’s going to hurt a lot of people, especially in the pocketbook… there’s just no way to make up the difference,” the employee said.
In a statement, spokesperson Lee Gordon said: “Mercury continues to grow market-share around the world and still employs thousands of people in Wisconsin and will continue to do so – but right now, it’s not sufficient to fully offset the overall market headwinds.”
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Also Read: Retirees Will Now Receive More Money For Social Security
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