IOLA BURNEY

Home in disrepair a danger to feisty 90-year-old

Iola Burney, 90, who suffers from dementia, dances with her daughter Denise Burney, 53, at her home in Riviera Beach.

By BARBARA MARSHALL

Palm Beach Post Staff Writer

At 90, Iola Burney is still going for the gusto.

“Right on, baby,” she sings out, from the big easy chair in her Riviera Beach living room that, like the rest of her house, is falling apart.

A lifetime of hard work as a Palm Beach housekeeper, followed by Alzheimer’s brought on by a brain aneurysm, hasn’t kept Iola from the party.

Spry and feisty, she’s ready to go anywhere, as long as there are people around and fun to be had. “Ready, Freddie,” she says, announcing her readiness to head to the West Palm Beach Alzheimer’s Community Care facility, where she spends weekdays.

While waiting to leave, she plays visitors an impromptu blues concert on her harmonica, stomping her foot on cracked and peeling 50-year-old linoleum.

The damaged floor is a lingering calling card from 2004’s Hurricane Frances, that blew the roof off the house Burney’s husband built in 1963.

In the years since, Burney’s daughter, Denise, had the roof fixed, but can’t afford to repair the interior. In addition to the dangerously uneven floor, daylight is visible through an exterior door held together with duct tape and an insistent slam of a rickety kitchen cabinet door might send a shower of dishes to the counter.

The too-short handrail at the front steps is a critical safety hazard that needs immediate replacement.

Recently, Denise had the house pressure-cleaned in preparation for painting, only to find it needs about $2,500 in stucco repair she can’t afford. She bursts into tears at her inability to help her cheerful but confused mother.

Photos of Iola in her younger years.

“I can’t fix things for her, which she doesn’t understand,” said Denise, who was laid off from her office job about three months ago.

With the help of five-day-a-week Alzheimer’s day care and a few hours a week from home health care aides, paid for by Medicaid, Denise tries to stay one step ahead of her exuberant mother.

“If you don’t have something for her to do, she’ll go find something and it may not be safe,” said Denise.

So she brings her mother “homework” in the form of grade school math work sheets and buys her baby dolls to dress and tuck into bed at night.

“She needs something to care for,” said Denise, who also scrubs the house weekly to meet her mother’s standards of cleanliness. “The state of her house is the only thing that gets her down. Otherwise, she is a lesson in having joy in life,” said Denise.

Overhearing her daughter mention her name, Iola chortles, as if in agreement. “You know it, baby.”

IOLA’S WISH

Iola Burney’s roof blew off during 2004’s Hurricane Frances and the interior of her home has never been repaired. Lack of adequate handrails on the steep front steps and a peeling, uneven linoleum floor inside make the home dangerous for an elderly woman with dementia who uses a walker. The windows leak, the temperature of the sole wall air-conditioner can no longer be adjusted and daylight can be seen through an exterior door held together with duct tape. Kitchen cabinets need replacing. In addition, the home’s exterior needs stucco repair and painting.

NOMINATED BY: Alzheimer’s Community Care, West Palm Beach