Carol Altmann – The Terrier

Lyndoch Living is selling both its $22 million Lyndoch Primary Care Centre – which opened less than six months ago – and the May Noonan Hostel in Terang which it bought in 2018, as it tries to stay afloat.

Indeed Lyndoch hopes to sell both assets by the end of the financial year with potential buyers now emerging.

In addition, the $100 million, grand-slam masterplan is also on hold and may never be revived.

As we know, Lyndoch is bleeding money.

It’s haemorrhaging from a fatal combination of low resident numbers (around 72 per cent occupancy), the $22 million primary care centre being virtually empty, and May Noonan Hostel only 50 per cent full, with an ongoing battle to find staff so more beds can be opened.

While Lyndoch is not insolvent – thanks to a buffer of residential bonds which don’t have to be refunded all at the same time – it can’t keep going the way it is.

What is it doing to turn the ship around?

I’ve spent the past few weeks trying to answer that question.

I’ve pieced together bits and pieces from sources inside and outside of Lyndoch, including a sit-down, face-to-face conversation with the Acting CEO Jill Davidson who reiterated earlier public statements that, under her watch, Lyndoch will focus first and foremost on its core business.

That core business – wait for it – is looking after the elderly.

Thankyou, Jill. At last, someone is in charge who has their eye on the main game and not the puffed up trimmings and trappings of being a CEO or, god help us, CEO OF THE YEAR.

The bloated administration at Lyndoch Living is also under review, as are all the partnerships and sponsorships put in place which struggled to explain their relevance or benefit to the elderly residents who just want quality, daily care and a good hot cup of tea.

All that we feared and warned about has come to pass.

All of the red flags are at full hoist.

Some of those who raised these flags deserve a special mention tonight, including the Keep Lyndoch Living Group led by retired naval intelligence officer Jim Burke and medical expert Professor James Dunbar.

In 2021, the pair launched a petition which attracted more than 1000 signatures asking to stop the primary care centre from being built until there was an independent review into its viability.

The Lyndoch board shrugged it off and the-then chief operating officer Elizabeth Green (who has since resigned) was shuffled out to assure us the plan was fail proof.

Well, that’s what the highly paid consultants from Melbourne said.

They were wrong. And where are these consultants now?

Which brings me to the real hero of the piece – Allan Conway, who was acting Chief Financial Officer before the first sod was turned.

Allan did all he could to warn the-then CEO Doreen Power and the board led by Sue Cassidy that the plan could sink Lyndoch.

His concerns were dismissed because, once again, the highly paid consultants from Melbourne said all would be well.

So millions of dollars were borrowed and the health care centre was built and now it has just one tenant: the 10-GP medical clinic owned by Lyndoch.

And after overseeing all of this – all of it – the former CEO/on leave CEO is still on the payroll as lawyers negotiate her settlement because in 2020 the blind board was stupid enough to sign up for another five years of that kind of “leadership and vision”.

From all of this blindness and stupidity, the community is left with the flickering flames of a fire sale and our once-proud aged care home rebuilding itself from the ground up.

It’s a chapter we must learn from and never forget and my job these next few months is to unpick exactly how we got here.

Carol Altmann – The Terrier

Here’s some of what I know about the $22 million Lyndoch Living medical clinic which is shrouded in uncertainty about its future and the future of the entire building, which opened just four months ago.

First, the medical clinic now has just 10 GPs, including part-time GPs, which is half the number (20) Lyndoch planned for and needs to make the place viable.

These GPs pay Lyndoch an annual fee to be in the building and without them, Lyndoch’s business plan (which we have never seen), falls completely apart.

The GPs can leave at any time – they are free to go wherever they like – giving 12 weeks’ notice. Many have left, and the former Warrnambool Medical Clinic practice which Lyndoch bought in 2019 for a whopping $1.3m and rolled into its “core business” is now a smouldering husk.

Second, the well-regarded General Manager of the clinic, Sue Fleming, has resigned. I understand she left some weeks ago, but Ms Fleming’s resignation has not been announced by Lyndoch and so far there is no replacement. The ship has no captain.

Third, the awful, ugly building (the result of three or four re-designs) is only half full and only half finished.

The top floor is unfinished and empty, as are two prime spaces at the front of the building with no internal walls and wires dangling from the ceiling.

Fourth, until five days ago, Lyndoch Healthcare Pty Ltd (which oversees it all) had four directors.

The directors were Lyndoch Living chair Sue Cassidy, board member Andrew Paton, Lyndoch former CEO/MIA/on-leave/back-in-Sunbury Doreen Power and Ms Fleming.

As of 2 Feb, it has just two directors: Ms Cassidy and Mr Paton.

In what I’m sure is a completely unrelated move, both Ms Cassidy and Mr Paton have recently made career changes, with Ms Cassidy closing down her hairdressing salon, and Mr Paton leaving his managerial position at the Warrnambool City Council.

When I last asked if the directors of the Lyndoch medical clinic would be paid, the question was considered “hypothetical”. Having learnt this information tonight, I will be asking the question again tomorrow.

In the meantime, the clinic is losing money. Worse, the entire building is now officially an expensive millstone around Lyndoch’s neck, with some saying it will pull the whole place under unless – at the very least – the building is sold.

Lyndoch borrowed big to build the joint: now it’s on borrowed time to make it work.

We’ll keep watching.

Carol Altmann – The Terrier

THOUGHTS: How do you feel when you read headlines like this about Lyndoch Living, which acknowledge what we tried to warn about so many years ago?

At last serious action is being taken. Finally Lyndoch is considering selling that catastrophic failure: the half empty, over-sized, ego-driven monstrosity of a medical clinic.

And finally the slopping pig’s trough of highly paid management positions, consultancies, partnerships and sponsorships created by the former CEO and embraced by the board is being emptied.

I must admit that as I read this front page story, I swung between relief and rage, between vindication and sadness, because nobody took this seriously before it was almost too late.

We were dismissed by the Lyndoch hierarchy and board as a bunch of “social media” stirrers. For years, a couple of blockheads at The Standard dismissed the investigative reporting behind this story as the work of “just a blogger”, which meant they could continue to slap each other on the back while at the same time being completely played by the Lyndoch PR machine.

The Keep Lyndoch Living group, including Jim Burke who has written a terrific piece tonight (LINK AT THE END), was written off by the Lyndoch board as not being worthy of attention.

And thousands of people who signed not one, but two petitions to try and save Lyndoch, were also written off.

But we hung in there. We never gave up and we won’t, until this is set right. I am so proud to be among the terriers, so proud of Keep Lyndoch Living, so proud of every single person who has stood up for Lyndoch publicly and bravely: we have never lost sight of caring for our elderly and the staff who care for them.

Please skip across to read Jim Burke’s piece on KLL, it’s a beauty. Here is the link.

Exclusive. Carol Altmann – The Terrier.

More than a dozen local GPs have signed a powerful letter to the Lyndoch Living board, calling for action on the “detrimental” impact to the health of current and former staff.

In an unprecedented move, GPs from across at least three separate Warrnambool clinics have asked the board to deal with the “serious situation” affecting both residential care and staff wellbeing.

To protect the individuals, I am not going to disclose the names of the signatories, but they include extremely experienced and respected GPs.

Here is the letter in full:

“We the undersigned general practitioners have taken the extraordinary step to write this letter to you to voice our concerns about the current situation at Lyndoch Living.

Over a period of many years Lyndoch has provided high level care to our residents and in large part this has been due to the input of the very dedicated, skilful long- term staff members.

We are aware that a large number of experienced staff, in both clinical and non-clinical areas have resigned and left Lyndoch in the last number of months. This includes several experienced unit managers and the previous Director of Nursing.

We are aware that a number of these ex-staff members have attended GPs for issues relating to their previous workplace experience.

We have also noted that the loss of so many experienced long- term staff has created extra pressure on the remaining staff and has negatively affected the level of patient care at Lyndoch.

We write as a group of local GP’s very concerned about the effects of this on the existing residents and remaining staff but also with significant concerns about detrimental health issues that have arisen in some of the staff members that have left.

We would ask you direct your attention to this serious situation as soon as timely possible.”

The letter was delivered to the Lyndoch Living board yesterday, after being circulated among local clinics in recent weeks to gather signatures.

The letter pulls no punches and forces the board to look at a critical and shocking part of this whole crisis: staff trauma.

While residents’ care is quite rightly a priority, so many staff have also suffered terribly at Lyndoch these past seven years.

As the GPs now make clear, they have been treating former and current Lyndoch staff for “detrimental health issues” directly connected to their working at Lyndoch Living.

I know these stories, because I have spoken to so many of these people – literally dozens over these past four years – including those who felt suicidal, those who suffer severe anxiety, or panic attacks, those who have been unable to work since, and those who still require medication to sleep, due to the trauma they experienced.

This is shameful.

What is unforgivable, however, is that the board knew staff were suffering.

They knew, and they continued to back the “on-leave” CEO Doreen Power until the very last.

The board knew, because it saw the staff survey results from January 2020 –  more than two years ago – that contained this damning paragraph:

“A small sample of around 10-15 respondents stated that the CEO’s culture of intimidation, manipulation and bullying greatly impacted their safety, health and wellbeing.

“They said they witnessed her bullying others and making decisions in regard to her own self-interests and not the organisation as a whole.”

The board read it and did nothing.

The board knew because it read exit interviews and letters from some of these former staff, but, until three weeks ago, continued to back the former CEO.

This is absolutely shameful.

More than 200 staff, including so many experienced hands, have poured out of Lyndoch these past two years and the flow-on has been catastrophic.

Survivors of abuse will understand that trauma is compounded by not being believed, by being ignored, and by having nowhere to turn other than to the abuser.

This is the Lyndoch story under Ms Power, who has a track record in this appalling behaviour, and who the board chose to believe above the poor, suffering staff.

Lyndoch needs to heal and this cannot happen under a board which has overseen so much pain.

At the very least, the Chair should accept full responsibility and resign.

The rest of the board must follow. Open up general memberships, call for board nominations, and, to quote Oliver Cromwell: ” In the name of God, go.”

[The petition to remove the Lyndoch board is open until 31 August. https://tinyurl.com/3nwac5nc You can download a physical copy here: https://tinyurl.com/2p9xd8x7]

Carol Altmann – The Terrier

The plot thickens around the departure of the Lyndoch Living CEO, Doreen Power, with speculation that Ms Power’s sudden exit up the Princes Highway is linked to financial issues surrounding Lyndoch that are now under investigation.

I’ve spent the past nine days digging into exactly why the axe fell so quickly on the CEO last Thursday week (Aug 4) after years of allegations about Ms Power’s management style fell on deaf ears and the Lyndoch board continued to back her to the hilt.

As was reported here, Ms Power was confronted by board chair Sue Cassidy and treasurer Kane Grant and, soon after, left her office armed with two bags of belongings.

As was also reported here, the day before Ms Power left, WorkSafe had received a long list of complaints about Lyndoch lodged by a law firm on behalf of the complainants.

This could have been the final blow.

But no.

I have since learned there is mounting concern about Lyndoch’s financial position, including whether information relied upon to build Lyndoch’s financial picture has been accurate.

These concerns include:

the financial impact of changes to the payment system for home care packages, with Lyndoch no longer having access to a big pot of home care funds ($2.5 million as of March 2021) that sat in its bank account;

whether this big pot of funds for home care packages was used to pay for other services – say, for example, toward the new medical clinic – in the hope it could be later topped up by home care clients (a Ponzi-style approach);

the financial impact of much greater competition in home care packages, which has gouged Lyndoch’s home client list;

the financial impact of having between 50 and 55 empty beds across Lyndoch and May Noonan Hostel – unprecedented;

concerns about the impact of rising interest rates on the $12 million borrowed by Lyndoch to fund its new $22m medical clinic;

concerns about the financial impact of having five apartments for sale in the Waterfront Living complex;

the difficulty of selling these apartments amid concerns about the deteriorating condition of their exteriors;

concerns Lyndoch must legally pay out the owners and/or estate of these apartments after a certain time, regardless of whether the apartment has sold;

concerns raised by residents within Waterfront Living about the location and use of their annual maintenance fee/sinking fund.

That’s a lot to take in, but it all comes down to cash flow: what Lyndoch expected to bring in, what it has to pay out.

And the terrible possibility facing the Lyndoch board is that all is not what it seemed.

Two important things to say here:

First is that residential accommodation bonds are guaranteed by the Federal Government, so – regardless of where this ends – these are protected by law and residents and their families can take comfort they are not at risk of losing their money.

Second is that the resignation of the most recent Chief Financial Officer was clearly yet another warning bell.

In fact four Chief Financial Officers leaving in four years is not just a warning bell, but a big loud hooter that wakes everyone in the night.

If what I am being told now is correct, and I believe it is, then what we have always feared is coming to pass.

We tried to warn the board and they didn’t listen.

Collectively, this house-of-cards scenario was raised more than 18 months ago on this page, by the Terrier, then by former Chief Financial officer Allan Conway, and then by the Keep Lyndoch Living group which formed because of unanswered questions over Lyndoch’s finances.

Mr Conway set the alarm bells off, but nobody listened.

The Keep Lyndoch Living team led by Jim Burke and Prof James Dunbar tried to raise the alarm, but nobody listened.

And The Terrier – 162 stories later – tried to raise the alarm, and nobody with the power to act, listened.

But the board is listening now and so it must, because they are responsible for not asking the hard questions.

It is now incumbent upon the board chair Sue Cassidy and treasurer Kane Grant to step up and tell us what is going on.

They need to assure the community that all is well, that none of what I have raised here is correct, that Lyndoch’s finances are exactly as they should be, and that Ms Power is on annual leave because she decided to take a holiday to Port Douglas.

Now is the time for plain speaking, not bullshite about annual leave.

Now is the time for absolute, rock solid, honest truth.