A bit of sticker shock for Essex County councillors.
The Sun Parlor Home in Leamington is getting a significant increase in the 2017 budget.
The long-term care home needed another $1.436-million-dollars compared to what it got in 2016 — an 18.7% increase.
Top administrator at the Sun Parlor Home Lynda Monik says the increase solely deals with staffing costs as the home works to meet provincial training obligations.
"I very much believe that all of our staff need some of this training," says Monik. "Only some staff were trained in certain things like general persuasive approach whereas I believe everybody in the home should be trained in that."
Monik says staff are having to deal with behaviours she hasn't seen in her 35 years in the profession — including one incident where a resident wanted to stick his head through a window.
"Their behaviours are odd. They're hoarding and we'll find all kinds of things stuffed and hoarded into drawers, desks and under beds and things like this," says Monik.
The home was built in 1992 and has been somewhat neglected leading to a bigger bill today.
"There are some things that have not been done over the course of a number of years so we are advancing a new nurse call system — that install was in 1992; it's 2017 and we have not replaced the system," says Monik.
Other improvements at the home captured under the county's capital budget include the new nurse call system as well as sidewalk and parking lot repaving.