As the only funeral home in Greenstone closes, a Thunder Bay business is expanding its reach

The only funeral home in the Municipality of Greenstone is shutting down but a business in Thunder Bay, Ont., is stepping in to help families access services closer to home.

Normand Glineault has been the funeral director and manager of Fawcett Funeral Home in Geraldton for 36 years. It serves families as far east as Hornepayne and as far south as Marathon, as well as six surrounding First Nations.

Glineault has been trying to sell his business so he can retire for almost three years, "with no interest whatsoever, not a single offer."

About 4,700 people live in Greenstone, which encompasses Beardmore, Caramat, Geraldton, Jellicoe, Longlac, MacDiarmid, Nakina and Orient Bay. The municipality spans more than3,100square kilometres.

Fawcett Funeral Home serves about 70 to 80 families a year, said Glineault. The next closest funeral home is either 250 kilometres east in Hearst or 280 kilometres southwest in Thunder Bay.

In order to fill the gaps, Everest Funeral Chapel, which has three locations in Thunder Bay, is expanding its presence into the Greenstone area.

"It's about providing care for the people of Greenstone. It's not about money or anything," said Matt MacKenzie, assistant manager of Everest Funeral Chapel. "It's going to be a big loss without Norm, so we're there to step up as we're needed."

Fawcett officially closes its doors at the end of the month, but MacKenzie expects a smooth transition as Everest has already set roots in the community.

Everest is renting out space in Glineault's garage in Geraldton to serve as a hub, and has also added more all-wheel drive vehicles to its fleet. It's also renting an apartment for staff to use when they come up from Thunder Bay to offer services in Greenstone, MacKenzie said.

"It'll be a challenge at times, but we're willing to do it. We have good staff and our area already goes four hours the other way so we're just expanding the radius," he said.

Training the next generation of workers

Equinox Gold opened its new Greenstone Gold Mine in Geraldton this May, with a grand opening ceremony planned this Thursday. The company says it will create 500 jobs over its initial 14-year mine life.

"The business community in Geraldton all thought that with this new gold mine opening up in town, that there would be lots of businesses opening in town and the many business owners that are close to retirement age would have people lined up to want to purchase the businesses and that has not happened," Glineault said.

Meanwhile, Geraldton is also losing its Beer Store and another local business, MacIver's Auto Service.

James McPherson, mayor of Greenstone, said the problem lies with a shortage of local workers.

"The reality is 15 years ago, the forest industry shut down up here. We lost over 450 direct jobs, so the people had to leave," McPherson said.

"We have a huge hole of available workers, and so with that, people are coming in from outside [Greenstone] to work and then going back to their homes."

The mine, hospital, and other community partners in Greenstone have ramped up efforts to encourage training opportunities for youth to entice them to stay in the community, he said.

"Then we can start getting the growth in the economy," McPherson said. "[The mine is] a great anchor it's up to us to build on it now."