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When 93-year-old Lettie James, who was living autonomously in an apartment in a seniors’ residence in Lachine, was given less than three weeks’ notice that she was to be summarily moved to a sister facility in LaSalle, the retired Anglican priest was livid.

For one, she had no intention of moving to LaSalle, away from family on the West Island. James, now widowed, chose to move to Les Floralies Lachine in 2015 specifically because it was near family.

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For another, she had a valid lease: It runs to the end of August. And yet she was given less than three weeks’ notice to vacate her 4½ on the fifth floor of one of the residence towers because the floor was being transformed into a unit for people requiring care.

And she heard about the move the way many of us learn things: through the rumour mill.

“Nobody had said a word to me,” she said.

When her social worker, who heard from the daughter of one of James’s neighbours, told her about the plan, James went to the administrator of Résidence Les Floralies Lachine, Lucie Morissette, to ask when she had planned to tell her she was moving.