Law Threatens Sisterly Bond : Companions: The two nonagenarians, their relatives and the co-owners of a private board-and-care home are defying a state order which says the older sibling needs to be in a convalescent facility.

In old age, the two sisters have found companionship in each other. And they don’t want the state to separate them.

Hazel Nichols, 96, and Mildred Sarff, 91, share a bedroom in a private board-and-care home here for the elderly. They hold hands from time to time and smile as they chat and reminisce about the past.

But their faces froze in terror at the mention that the older sister might have to leave.

“Oh, no!” moaned Sarff. “Don’t let them take my sister away!” The older sister, in a loud, firm voice, added: “I don’t want to move. I’m happy here with my sister.”

The sisters are caught in the cusp of a state law designed to protect the interests of the elderly. The state law says a bedridden person may not stay at a board-and-care home because such facilities do not provide skilled medical and nursing care at the level of a convalescent home.

State inspectors have decided that Nichols technically is bedridden because she has trouble getting into and out of her bed on her own. The state therefore has ordered what amounts to a separation order for the two sisters. Sarff may stay but Nichols must no longer remain in the Sunshine Corner board-and-care home at 6911 San Juan Circle, according to the state order. The state says that Nichols needs a convalescent home instead.

But the sisters, their relatives and Bill and Char Turner, the co-owners of Sunshine Corner, all are defying the state order, which was supposed to have gone into effect on Monday.

“We just can’t do this to these sisters, separate them,” Bill Turner said Monday. “We can’t do it even though the state is threatening to fine us $50 a day.”

Nichols’ daughter, Barbara Philbrook of Buena Park, also emphatically said she didn’t want her mother moved to a convalescent home. “Mother wants to be here with her sister,” Philbrook said. “They’re both here by choice. They don’t want to move.”

The order for Nichols to move came from the state’s Community Care Licensing Division, which oversees board-and-care homes. The division checks private homes to make sure that the elderly are well cared for and are physically able to live in those facilities.

“We’re not trying to be the heavies in this,” said Diane Hawthorne, licensing program supervisor for the Orange County offices of the Community Care Licensing Division. “Our action is to protect Mrs. Nichols and the other residents of that home. If there were a fire or some other emergency, a bedridden person is in serious danger and could be a danger for everyone else in that home.”

But the two sisters and the co-owners dispute that Nichols is actually bedridden. They note that she can walk unassisted. They say she can even get in and out of her bed unassisted, although Nichols concedes, with a smile: “I’m not as good at this as I’d like. But I’m working on it.”

Relatives of the sisters pay $1,200 a month for the sisters’ shared bedroom with twin beds. The sisters also have use of the rest of the house, in which there is one other elderly female resident. The home is on a cul-de-sac in a well-kept area of single-family homes.

Philbrook said she cared for her mother “as long as I could. Now she likes being here with her sister. This is a very nice place, and she doesn’t want to leave.”

Hawthorne, of the state licensing division, said the home will be fined $50 a day, starting today, for as long as Nichols lives there.

“It’s the law,” Hawthorne said. “If they defy the law, they (the homeowners) could also lose their license.”

Hawthorne said the state agency, however, will not forcibly try to remove Nichols from the house. “We don’t do anything like that,” she said.

Bill Turner said Sarff could join her older sister in a convalescent home, “but they don’t want that. They like living here.”

The sisters said they couldn’t understand why the state was pushing the issue. Both sisters have difficulty hearing, but they are clear-minded. They proudly told visitors on Monday about their background, noting that they are descendants of California pioneers.

“My grandfather came to California by crossing the desert in 1849,” Nichols said.

Her younger sister interjected: “And when he got here, he bought land. You could buy land for 25 cents an acre in those days.”

They noted that they share the same birthday: Oct. 26. They were both born in Los Angeles, the children of Cora May and Arthur Varley Slack. Their parents’ 19th-Century wedding photo hangs on a wall in their bedroom.

The sisters have one surviving daughter each. They also have many grandchildren, great-grandchildren and great-great-grandchildren, they said. They see their relatives regularly, they added. But mostly the two sisters spend time with each other, and they repeatedly said they want that companionship to continue, no matter what the state decrees.

“I like living here because the people are so good to us,” Nichols said.

Her younger sister said: “My sister doesn’t want to leave, and I don’t want her to leave.”

Philbrook, Nichols’ daughter, said she thinks that state law should be flexible enough to allow her mother to remain with her sister.

“All we’re asking for is for the state to wiggle those laws enough to make my mother happy,” Philbrook said. “She wants to stay her with her sister, and I think the state ought to let her do that.”