The centre, in a wing adjoining Frankton’s Lakes District Hospital (LDH), has been empty since Arvida relocated the elderly occupants to its new facility at the Queenstown Country Club retirement village last September.
White says he approached Health New Zealand Te Whatu Ora’s (HNZ) southern area facilities manager about taking over some of the wing.
"If you looked at how it would be redeveloped, we might take six to eight rooms to redevelop into two suites with a family room and quiet area and that sort of thing."
However, White says the Health NZ manager told him his organisation, which has a memorandum of understanding with Hospice Southland, would have to provide nurses and healthcare.
"What we really don’t want to do is get involved in employing staff and contracts and all that sort of stuff.
"Surely, if it’s part of the hospital, then the hospital has nurses on site all the time.
"Why can’t they be part of what’s going on?"
As a Lions Club member, White says he was part of a group of volunteers who spruced up the LDH grounds, including the former care centre wing, just before Christmas.
He fears it’ll suffer the same fate as the neglected former Walker home on council-owned property at Ladies Mile, which eventually had to be demolished.
HNZ, asked last week if it had progressed with options for the vacated wing, referred Mountain Scene to its original reply last September: "HNZ is currently considering options for utilisation of this space."
White comments: "They have had, is it three years, for them to come to some sort of a plan, and to not have a plan to do anything with it, I mean, is diabolical."
