Residents still at closing South Holland senior living facility slowly moving out

A month after its original deadline for closure, Celebrate Senior Living South Holland still houses 41 residents waiting to find a new place to live, according to a board member and spokesman for building owner Elevate Housing Foundation.

Since November, when word broke about the facility’s closing, residents were told that Jan. 10 was the tentative deadline for when the 150 residents would have to find new places to live. But a month later, more than a quarter of the residents remain in the senior living community, known as the Holland Home, and a possible new deadline has not been provided.

“They say ‘Well, we know you’ve taken the steps to do what you have to do, so all we can do is be patient,’” said Nona Arnold, a 75-year-old resident who remains at Celebrate. “But I know they can’t be patient forever.”

Arnold said she has been accepted into two places, one in Calumet City and another in Park Forest. It took months to even get accepted because, for residents like Arnold who require government assistance, the state has to check to ensure the facilities are up to code.

Arnold wants to move to Green Oaks of Park Forest. It’s a little more expensive and the room is smaller than her housing at Celebrate. But she said that unlike Celebrate, they do not advertise services that residents later learn aren’t really available.

“They said there was 24-hour doctor care, nurses care. But there really wasn’t,” Arnold said. “If you get sick you have to call 911 because you’re ‘independent’ but they didn’t say that when you first got here.”

Still, Arnold said the building managers have been helpful in finding her a place to move to with repeated check-ins on how communication is going.

Elevate Housing Foundation spokesman Tony Shir, who handles media for the facility, did not respond to a request for an interview beyond providing how many people remain.

Today, the Holland Home appears like a ghost town with many of the lights out, vacant community rooms and a shuttered cafeteria. Remaining residents are served pre-packaged boxes of food instead of being served meals cooked onsite.

Another remaining resident, Betty Page, 65, said she signed her year-long lease with Celebrate in October, just weeks before news became public about the facility closing. Elevate has said it is closing due to years of financial losses, something public records support.

Alvin Williams, 76, has lived at Celebrate for about two years and plans to move to Victory Centre of South Chicago this month. He is excited about the move because while slightly more expensive than Celebrate, Victory has better amenities.

“The people that work in this place are terrible,” said Williams. “The people that work here, that’s some bad attitudes.”

South Holland Mayor Don DeGraff’s office said that while they have offered assistance to Celebrate and Elevate in case help is needed with the closure and resident transfer process, so far the village has not had a direct role.

hsanders@chicagotribune.com