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VOL. 26, NO. 59
Private care facility targets growing retirement sector BY TAMARA CUNNINGHAM THE NEWS BULLETIN
Charlene Nelson stopped by the building Tuesday where her nephew, Dominik Ambrose David Billy, 7, died in a fire in his family’s second-storey apartment. Nanaimo Fire Rescue and B.C. Coroners Service are still investigating the cause of the fire. CHRIS BUSH/THE NEWS BULLETIN
Family remembers ‘outgoing’ boy I INVESTIGATION INTO cause of fatal Albert Street fire continues. BY CHRIS BUSH THE NEWS BULLETIN
While investigators sift through the debris of a fire that killed a young boy on the weekend, his family is preparing to put him to rest and rebuild their lives. Dominik Ambrose David Billy, 7, of Nanaimo died in B.C. Children’s Hospital Sunday morning despite attempts by police, firefighters and paramedics to save his life after fire swept through the second-storey apartment where the family of eight lived above a thrift store in a nearly
100-year-old wooden building at 361 Albert St. Investigators from Nanaimo Fire Rescue and the B.C. Coroners Office were back on site Tuesday probing what sparked the fire. Shirley Antoine described her nephew as an outgoing, articulate boy who really loved professional wrestling. “John Cena was his favourite wrestler, so I’ve been out asking everybody if they can find a John Cena shirt for him,” Antoine said. The night before the fire Antoine recalled Billy wrestling with his cousin at a family get together for his grandfather’s birthday, tossing each other down and bouncing off a bed like it was a wrestling ring “They were having fun and all of us were just around them letting them
do whatever,” Antoine said. Billy attended Georgia Avenue Community School. Some of his artwork was brought to his family Monday, including a picture on which he’d written, ‘My peace is spending time at home with Mom and Dad.’ “He was special,” Antoine said. “He wanted to be a wrestler. We called him our Dominator. I said, ‘I’m going to call you the Dominator when you become a wrestler, Dom.’” People left teddy bears, small toys and votive candles at a vigil on Albert Street Monday night. Billy’s parents and five siblings grapple with his death and the loss of their home and belongings. One of Billy’s sisters asked Antoine if they could have a Christmas tree. See ‘DONATIONS’ /10
A new, private dementia care facility could break ground in north Nanaimo next year. Avenir Retirement, a company with memory care centres in the United States, plans to build an 83-bed, private-pay facility near Long Lake and Nanaimo North Town Centre for people with different stages of Alzheimer’s and dementia. Rooms are expected to cost residents between $4,500 to $5,900 a month at the new Nanaimo Memory Care, a four-storey facility with round-theclock care and different ‘neighbourhoods’ of people with similar cognitive abilities and stages of disease. According to Jason We need a Craik, a partner with Avenir, the model is balance of already used in Arizona where the comfunded and pany has multiple private-pay facilities, but this is first time they facilities that the will bring it to CanOther locations specialize in ada. in the country have also been earmarked dementia. as the company plans an expansion in the United States and north of the border with dementia becoming more of an issue for North Americans. “Certainly we need a balance of funded and private-pay facilities that specialize in dementia,” Craik said. “It’s becoming an epidemic here throughout North America so we are excited to bring our model to Nanaimo and believe it’s going to serve a great purpose in helping change families’ lives with their loved ones.” Craik said Nanaimo is a destination location for retirees and seniors, with a large senior population.
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See ‘DEMENTIA’ /10