By By JOHN EBY / Dowagiac Daily News
It's not surprising new Dowagiac Nursing Home Administrator Tim Hayes dove right in Sept. 13.
Diving is a hobby. He's already been in touch with the dive club in Niles which hits lakes at midnight on New Year's Eve.
His wife shares his fascination for shipwrecks, but not his passion for diving. "She won't even try it," he said Tuesday afternoon.
Hayes, 48, does not seem averse to change, either, considering his desire to redefine the nursing home's relationship with the community to make it more of a two-way partnership.
That true partnership "benefits both of us," Hayes said.
Mindful of carolers who come to the nursing home during the holidays or students researching oral history for a class project, "I'd like to change some of that attitude. As I get to know the residents more, there may be some who have experiences or been involved in something that would benefit going and doing something at the school - instead of the school coming here.
His first order of business is learning all his residents' names.
Hayes looks forward to meeting more citizens at an open house scheduled next Wednesday, Oct. 5, from 1:30 to 3 and from 6 to 7:30 p.m.
The nursing home is on Uneta Street, off E. Prairie Ronde.
While his previous employment was at a nursing facility in Detroit, the Fowlerville resident said he has been coming through the area for 20 years, "traveling through and doing business in Dowagiac and Niles. I dealt with all the distributing out of South Bend, Ind., to Ridge stores, which you still have, but now it's NAPA."
He grew up in Fowlerville. "It's actually a smaller community than this is," he said. "We're a village." His four children are all grown.
His wife worked in the nursing home industry and "I just fell in love with dealing with the residents and decided to make a career change. I've enjoyed it ever since. It's been a good change."
That was about three years ago.
Where Dowagiac Nursing Home was once affiliated with Lee Memorial Hospital, it's now overseen by Red Oak Health Care Management Inc.
Dowagiac Nursing Home has a 42-bed Alzheimer's unit.
Hayes hates the words "nursing home" because of their historic connotation as a place to go to die.