CLEARFIELD TWP — The state Department of Public Welfare issued a search warrant again and attempted on Thursday to remove senior citizens from an unlicensed personal care facility/boarding home.

The DPW went to the facility to remove residents from Kim’s Caring Cabin, 135 Harris Road, but none of the 14 residents wanted to leave. The state had shut down the home in June and relocated 15 residents.

Kimberly Fair, 32, who owns the business, has since reopened the facility as a boarding home.

She said the visits and searches from the DPW and the Butler Agency on Aging in recent months are traumatic for her, her three young daughters and her residents. The DPW has searched the facility three times since June.

She said she’s tired of being visited by the DPW.

“They’ve conducted two unfounded search warrants in less than a week,” Fair said. “This is harassment.”

Rose Ann Groff, who was among the residents moved in June, returned to Fair’s facility Sunday on her own. The Pittsburgh personal care facility where she was in June was not properly taking care of her, she claimed, nor was it tending to her medical conditions. She suffers from end-stage COPD.

“I thought I had to leave (during the June raid), and they sent me to a place that was institutionalized, which was miserable,” said Groff, 60. “There’s only love here. Kim is the most caring person I know.”

However, Groff’s return sparked the subsequent searches by the DPW. It had received a complaint that another person was admitted into the personal care home, and an individual who had previously refused to leave had requested to be moved.

As an unlicensed personal care facility, Fair said no more than three seniors citizens are allowed to be unrelated to caretakers. While she has 14 residents staying with her now, several family members work at the facility as volunteers, she said.

However, the state agency does not see things the same way.

“DPW intends to take legal action to stop Ms. Fair from operating unlicensed personal care home. Ms. Fair’s assumptions that she can continue to operate an unlicensed facility will be determined in a court of law,” said Carey Miller of the state Department of Public Welfare in an emailed statement.

A court date has not been set yet.

The Butler Agency on Aging did not return a phone call for comment Friday.