Menno Place in Abbotsford has presented recognition awards to five groups of staff for their work during the COVID-19 pandemic.
A socially distanced celebration was recently held to present the awards.
Those recognized were:
• Bas Kervel, Renate Steffan and Robin Friesen, who procured vital personal protective equipment (PPE) when the site had only 34 pairs of goggles for 675 staff members. They incorporated community donations with purchases and received the product necessary to protect all staff.
• Ingrid Schultz, Ingrid Stahl, John Dyck and Timea Derbyshire, who started a TV station at Menno Place. The station has been active for about a year, but during the pandemic, the team has worked together to create from scratch a weekly schedule of shows on various topics such as morning prayer, church services, bingo, hymn sings, and chair and brain exercises. Each member of the team had learn sophisticated technology and become comfortable speaking to hundreds of people over a live stream.
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• David Janzen in maintenance and tech, who is behind the Menno Place live-streaming television station. He liaises with Telus Optik and is the tester, the fixer, the troubleshooter, and the visionary. He works on his days off, before his shift, after his shift and is always on-call. Without his expertise, the team that delivers the live-stream content to Channel 10 would have been overwhelmed by the technological aspects of running the station.
• Danielle Kinvig and Rebecca Poppovici, who had a goal of creating a way for residents to connect with loved ones during COVID-19. While the technology was available through Zoom, there were obstacles that the team needed to overcome. Aligning technology and coordinating schedules was challenging, and bookings needed to be seamlessly communicated. The pair worked tirelessly to train the team and launch the system. Now they have a complete online booking system to support Zoom calls in any resident’s room.
• Angela Ross-Fehr, who spearheaded the changes to meal delivery, which moved to having hot food carts serving residents in their individual apartment suites. Ross-Fehr orchestrated all of the necessary changes, and repurposed her team to receive and deliver groceries for residents. Staff who used to do dining room and dish cleanup were now going door-to-door to bring packages, mail, memos and deliveries to the residents.
Menno Place is the largest seniors’ campus of care in B.C., with 700 seniors calling it their home.
