LAWRENCE COUNTY Nursing home's future is in doubt

Vandals have used golf balls to break windows at the former nursing home.
By LAURE CIOFFI
VINDICATOR NEW CASTLE BUREAU
NEW CASTLE, Pa. -- It has been more than five months since the last patient left Hill View Manor, and the facility's fate is still in question.
Lawrence County commissioners say they are waiting for an appraisal of the county-owned nursing home and surrounding 35 acres of land before moving forward.
"I'd like to see someone purchase the building and grounds and put it back to use as a taxpaying property," Commissioner Steve Craig said. "But it's a big building and it has its handicaps."
Vandalism
Most recently, golf balls were used to break several windows, commissioners said. Adjacent to Sylvan Heights Golf Course, commissioners believe the vandalism was intentional and not the act of unskilled golfers.
Commissioner Ed Fosnaught said they never had problems with stray golf balls when the building was occupied because all of the tees face the other direction. Shenango Township Police have stepped up patrols in the area, and a maintenance man is still on the grounds, he said.
"If we catch them, we will prosecute," Fosnaught said.
The nursing home's last patient left in February, and most employees were laid off a short time later.
The facility had been licensed to care for 130 nursing home patients, but in recent years it averaged about 90 people. That number started to dwindle in 2003 after plans for a sale to private buyers were announced.
The buyer, Sylvan Heights Realty Partners, had said it was going to demolish most of the building -- which was largely unused because it didn't meet today's standards -- and build new wings to house the patients.
The deal fell through when county officials discovered that about $540,000 from private-pay patients ended up in the buyer's bank account before the sale closing. Sylvan Heights Realty Partners returned all but $140,000.
Lawsuits filed
County officials have filed a lawsuit against Sylvan to recoup the remaining money. Sylvan's partners filed a lawsuit against the county -- specifically Fosnaught, Controller Mary Ann Reiter and Solicitor John Hodge -- for the money lost in the collapsed sale.
Those lawsuits are slowly moving through the Lawrence County court system, and at Tuesday's meeting commissioners are planning to hire Goldberg, Kamin and Garvin, a Pittsburgh law firm, to handle the case.
Unemployment payments to the 110 laid-off employees will soon be ending. The county has a self-funded unemployment compensation program and must make payments to the state on a quarterly basis. About $130,000 had been paid out in unemployment claims in April. An additional $72,214 will be paid out soon, according to the county controller's office.
County commissioners say their next step after securing the appraisal will be to find someone to market the property. All three commissioners have said no one has approached them about buying it.
Commissioner Dan Vogler echoed his fellow commissioner's wishes about selling the property.
"I'd like to get that property on the tax rolls as soon as possible," he said.
cioffi@vindy.com