Salem Village workers in Joliet want their pay

Salem Village Nursing and Rehabilitation workers did not get paid last week and worry that two more checks owed them won’t be coming.

A staff of about 50 workers remain at Salem Village, the longtime Joliet nursing home that closed last month as residents were moved to new locations.

Salem Village employees who remain are scheduled to finish up work this week with their final paychecks coming April 4.

But most of the workers were not paid Wednesday, and they are left looking for answers on whether they will ever get the final pay due them.

“We can’t get any answers,” said Lorri Tibble, who was admissions director for Salem Village. “All our corporation is telling us is, ‘We’re working on it.’”

The Illinois Department of Labor will investigate the situation, a spokesman said.

“We have received a number of wage claims related to this employer in recent days and will be opening an investigation,” spokesman Paul Cicchini said in an email Monday.

Employees have been on the phone with ownership, management, and the corporate payroll division looking for answers.

“We’re getting the runaround, and here we sit with no paycheck,” Tibble said.

An employee at Healthcare Accounting Services, a Brentwood, Missouri company that processes paychecks for Salem Village employees, said she had no answers when asked whether the Salem Village workers would get paid.

“I have no information on that, but I’m trying to get something done,” said the Healthcare Accounting Services employee, who would not provide her name. “I’m letting the powers that be know what’s happening.”

Powers that be include Makhlouf Suissa, the primary owner of Salem Village who also apparently is an owner of Healthcare Accounting Services.

A call by the Herald-News to Suissa’s phone number was answered by a man who said, “I’m not talking to anybody. Thank you very much.” He then hung up.

“We’re just trying to get our checks. That’s all.”

—  Shanta Lewis, certified nursing assistant at Salem Village

Suissa and Healthcare Accounting Services have been getting media attention in the St. Louis area since December when the Northfield Village nursing home shut down without warning. Missouri officials had to step in to find new homes for Northfield Village residents, and employees at the nursing home were out of jobs without getting paid for their last days of work.

The relocation of Salem Village residents was done in an orderly fashion. The state received timely notice that the nursing home would close, and the last resident was moved out on Feb. 8, well ahead of schedule.

Employees got paid Feb. 21, their last regular payday before checks did not come in Wednesday, said Shanta Lewis, a certified nursing assistant at Salem Village.

Some employees got paid last week, too, but not many, Lewis said.

“Everybody who got direct deposit didn’t get their checks,” she said. “There are people who get paper checks, and some of them got paid.”

Lewis also said employees are getting no answers from management on the future of their last pay for work done at Salem Village.

“They don’t know,” she said. “We’re just trying to get our checks. That’s all.”

Suissa is a primary owner of five other nursing homes in Illinois and Missouri, according to government records. Except for Salem Village, all the nursing homes are in the St. Louis area.

He bought Salem Village in 1998 and used to visit the site weekly, said Tibble, a longtime employee.

“I’ve been here 40 years, and I can’t believe this is how it’s ending,” Tibble said.