Niagara Falls Calls For Ontario Ombudsman To Investigate Niagara Health System

By Doug Draper

Niagara Falls Mayor Jim Diodati and his council will be calling on the province’s dogged ombudsman, Andre Marin, to do what the mayor hopes will be a fearless, independent investigation of the Niagara Health System.

“We want the ombudsman to come in and do an investigation that is wide open and that leaves no leaf unturned,” Diodati told Niagara At Large in an interview. “I am very anxious for him to dig in so we can get answers to questions we have been asking for years.”

Niagara Falls’ council was among the first in Niagara, Ontario to call for the NHS’s new hospital complex, now being built in west St. Catharines, to be located in a more central location for all the region’s residents, and even if it wasn’t located in Niagara Falls. But the NHS refused to listen to it or to hundreds of doctors in the region who petitioned, and even took out full-page newspaper ads, calling for the same thing.

Diodati said any probe by the ombudsman should look at the reasons NHS bulldozed ahead with its decision to new hospital complex, costing more than a billion dollars, in west St. Catharines, and who is possibly benefiting financially from that decision. “I say follow the money,” the mayor said.
The Niagara Falls council also wants the ombudsman to zero in on the NHS’s so-called ‘Hospital Improvement Plan’ that will see most of the acute care services for the Niagara region, including maternity care, moved to the new west St. Catharines hospital site.

Niagara needs the ombudsman doing the investigation on the NHS, said the mayor, because he has more powers than practically anyone else in the province to look demand information from the health system that has not been made available before.

Niagara At Large has also posted a piece this September 1, headlined ‘Ontario Ombudsman Ready To Hear Complaints …’ Please check it out at Niagara At Large at http://www.niagaraatlarge.com and make it your business to let the ombudsman know about your questions and concerns.

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