Almost 70 years ago, a Winter Park nursing home opened to help care for elderly Black residents who during segregation had no place to go. And for decades the institution fulfilled that mission.

But operators of the facility, known today as The Gardens at DePugh Nursing Center , say it will close permanently in early December due to skyrocketing costs and stagnant Medicare and Medicaid reimbursements.

The board that operates the facility, long determined to provide top-quality care to low-income residents, realized in August that the end was near. Now efforts are underway to relocate residents of the 40-bed facility on Morse Avenue and then sell the 2-acre campus.

“The decision was painful and was not made lightly,” said Richard Baldwin Jr., chairman of the nonprofit’s board of truste

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