The health director in Hopkinton, Massachusetts is demanding answers after a series of new problems at the Golden Pond Assisted Living Facility.
Last month, an 86-year-old woman died in a unit there where the temperature reached 99 degrees. Now, 30 other residents have been taken to the hospital in the last three weeks, according to health director Shaun McAuliffe.
"I don't have access to why all the residents were transported. I do know that there were four complaining of heat-related issues," McAuliffe told WBZ-TV Tuesday.
The transports happened as the town and multiple authorities work to determine how the woman died on Wednesday, Sept. 30. A police report said her "apartment was extremely hot with the thermostat indicating that the room temperature was 99 degrees Fahrenheit."
According to the report, a facilities manager told police that the heat had been turned on a day prior.
According to a timeline provided to WBZ by McAuliffe, Hopkinton's Health, Building, and Fire Department staff found the temperature of the building to be above the legal threshold of 78 degrees Fahrenheit on Oct. 1. The dead woman's room was at 81 degrees and heating returns ranged from 85 to 104 degrees, McAuliffe wrote.
Golden Pond's HVAC contractor turned the heating system off on Oct. 1, but McAuliffe says the town continued to receive calls stating that the facility was dealing with temperature issues. The heating system remained off until Oct. 15.
The town also conducted a food safety inspection of the facility on Oct. 14 and found multiple issues including rodent droppings in a cookware storage room and cockroaches crawling along the wall in the food prep area of the kitchen.
McAuliffe said he's now seeking immediate action from the facility. He wrote a letter to Golden Pond's director and the Massachusetts Executive Office of Aging and Independence (EOAI) seeking an explanation for the facility's HVAC issues by Wednesday, Oct. 21.
"The Board of Health will take action if Golden Pond fails to comply with orders," the letter states.
The EOAI told the health director it had four inspectors on site Tuesday completing a full compliance audit.
Douglas Noble, director of operations at The Communities at Golden Pond, did not respond to a request for comment on this story.
He sent WBZ this statement after the resident's death:
"The Communities at Golden Pond, an assisted living residence, is closely cooperating with its regulatory agencies regarding the death of a resident last week," Noble said. "Our HVAC system is professionally maintained by a licensed contractor on both a seasonal and as-needed basis and was working properly at the time of this incident. Each apartment in our community has an individual thermostat that residents can operate directly, although we encourage our residents to push their call button for staff assistance with it."
McAuliffe said he has the power shut down Golden Pond, but noted it's a solution that might not work.
"I can't do that here because we have residents with various memory care issues and other needs, so there needs to be a plan in place," he told WBZ.
