YARMOUTH, N.S. — After 130 years in the community, the sun is setting on a historic boarding home in Yarmouth.
The 10-member volunteer board that oversees Sunset Terrace has decided the home will close at the end of October.
The board says over time the health needs of residents have exceeded its mandate and what the facility can offer. The large green Victorian boarding home on James Street — which also overlooks Yarmouth’s Main Street – was never meant to be, or designed to be, a seniors care facility.
In the past, the facility provided accommodations for residents 60 years or older and in good health. Now the average age of residents is often around 90.
“The clients we’re getting are needing health care and we’re just not equipped to do it. And we’re not built to do it. It’s just difficult,” explains board member Barb Rodney.
Many referrals also now come through Social Services — a sign those individuals are not able to get by on their own.
For months, Sunset Terrace has only had eight residents. It needs at least 20 to operate at breakeven. And COVID-19 — while not responsible for the closure decision — has contributed to the situation. The boarding home has not been accepting new residents since February due to COVID. And the future of the pandemic remains uncertain.
The decision to close was made during a July 21 special meeting.
“We certainly don’t want people to think we’re closing because of the COVID, we’re not. Even without COVID we probably still would have ended up closing,” says board member Mary Eldridge.
Home Care provides visits to clients at the facility to look after their needs. In the case of serious health issues, residents are treated at the hospital. Because those needs are beyond the scope and ability of Sunset Terrace, they don’t return to the boarding home. Others, however, have lived out their lives at Sunset Terrace.
Rodney and Eldridge say it was difficult and sad to inform residents and staff (there are eight staff members, some of whom are part-time) of the decision to close the facility, which has a lengthy community history.
“In fact, Mary and I had our rooms picked out, that’s how much we thought of it,” Rodney says.
Rodney and Edridge said last week that some residents had already found alternative living arrangements. The board felt it was important to give three months' notice of the pending closure to give people time to find a new home.
A long history
The history of Sunset Terrace dates back to the 1880s. Originally called the Old Ladies Home and operated by the Old Ladies Home Society (which still exists), the building was first constructed as a place for women of diminished needs to live. They had no husbands, fathers, or brothers in their lives. They were unmarried — spinsters, they were called — and/or widows.
The huge multi-level building, which opened in 1890, was constructed at a cost of $7,776. The total cost rounded out closer to $11,000 once the hot water and related infrastructure were installed.
Planning for the facility got underway in 1880 when a group of women first formed a social circle, making items to sell with the profits going to a hoped-for Old Ladies Home. Each woman provided 50 cents of materials at their first meeting in March 1880. Fairs, tables at the exhibition, bazaars, and other points of sales generated profits of $33, $150, $187, $195 to go towards a boarding home — and on it went.
Rodney and Eldridge recall aspects of the boarding home’s history.
“The ladies couldn’t smoke … or chew tobacco,” says Rodney.
“If they needed a tray taken to their room because they were sick, it cost 10 cents,” says Eldridge. “If they wanted to pay all their room and board upfront, if they had $1,000 they could stay for life — but they started staying too long so they had to do away with that. It wasn’t covering enough.”
The first male resident — and there have been others since — came to the boarding home in 2011.
“The women used to get their hair all done up and everything when we started admitted men,” laughs Eldridge.
Sunset Terrace never received government funding to operate — again, it wasn’t a seniors’ care facility. Operating funds came from boarding fees and an endowment fund. It once received an environmental grant to do insulation upgrades.
Over time the board/society did undertake some facility improvements, installing an elevator, converting closets into private washrooms for each room and purchasing new kitchen stoves. New doors, windows, and laminate flooring were installed.
Still, a walk through the facility with its narrow hallways, sitting room, dining room, bedrooms, and grand sun porch still feels like a throwback in time, with antique furniture pieces mixed among the present-day additions and black-and-white photos of the building’s matrons adorning walls.
And if you venture up to the attic your immediate reaction is — “It’s huge!”
But while the boarding home is closing, its roots are not being forgotten.
“The Old Ladies Home Society is who we are. We’ll remain and we’ll work with our endowment and focus on helping women’s needs in the town of Yarmouth, because that’s what it was set up for, to help women of minimal means. So we will continue with that,” Eldridge says.
Meanwhile, there is a melancholy air lingering at Sunset Terrace with its closure on the horizon.
“This has been a hard decision … but we’re just not in line for what people need anymore,” Rodney says.
“Most everyone seems to stay in their homes until they need nursing care but we can’t provide that. I think it’s good that they stay in their homes. Mary and I were in the VON — we tried to keep people there. But it’s just a sign of the times. We’ve outlived our mandate. I don’t know what else to say.”
Sunset Terrace will close on Oct. 31.
The building will be put up for sale.
