Residents of Fairview Retirement Village's Perry James Lodge will soon have fresh new rooms and bigger disabled access bathrooms, with major refurbishment works to begin early next month.
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At the start of this year, Fairview successfully received a $485,040 federal government grant, under the Aged Care Regional, Rural and Remote Infrastructure Grants scheme, to go towards the refurbishment of rooms, bathroom rebuilds and plumbing and electrical upgrades.
Now, after much detailed planning, the works are set to begin on July 8.
One full wing of Perry James Lodge will be refurbished as part of the upgrades, which will see 13 rooms, seven bathrooms and the medication store renovated to bring it in line with other parts of the aged care facility.
"It's already been done before," Fairview board member and head of the building committee Peter Burey said.
"This is bringing it back into line with the rest of the building, which had upgrades done in 2014 and 2016."
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The works will see the rooms modernised with new joinery, while the bathrooms will be fully renovated with new tiles and fittings. The bathrooms will also be made bigger and the doors widened to more easily accommodate walkers and wheelchairs.
The corridors will also get a facelift, with the exposed bricks to be painted white and new hand rails to be installed, in line with a previously renovated corridor.
The carpet in the hallways will also be replaced with vinyl flooring, to make it easier for residents to get around on walkers or wheelchairs.
"The hostel section was built back in the '70s and was meant for people looking to retire to hostel living," Mr Burey said.
"But people are ageing and getting older, so their care is much higher now when they come here."
Fairview facility manager Jane Mackney said the refurbishment will make a "huge" difference.
"It means we'll be able to accommodate changing resident needs," she said.
"It's going to brighten and freshen the rooms and make the bathrooms fit for purpose. It's basically a facelift."
The medication store will also be refurbished, so all medication - which is currently scattered in three different locations - can be stored in the one place.
"It'll be more convenient for staff," Ms Mackney said.
Originally, Fairview had hoped to add ensuites to some of the single rooms to provide residents with more choice of the type of room they could have, instead of only shared bathrooms, however Ms Mackney said they unfortunately didn't have the funds available for that type of reconstruction.
Work is expected to be completed in about 12 weeks. During this time, the affected residents will be housed on site in another area.