NAL Niagara south hospital,
A Brief Commentary by Doug Draper
Now Kevin Smith is talking!
NHS supervisor Kevin Smith
Smith was also quoted saying a new hospital in Niagara, Ontario’s southern tier would probably also mean “the closure of the majority of the other sites” in the south end.
Resident in south Niagara have felt increasingly alienated from the NHS (the body created by the province a dozen years ago to amalgamate most of Niagara’s hospital services) since that health system forged ahead more than three years ago with plans to build a super hospital, including a cancer and cardiac treatment centre, in the west end of St. Catharines rather than in a more central site in the region.
For many thousand south of Niagara residents, the NHS had already written them off as “second-class citizens” (as more than a few put it) when it’s now-defunct board and CEO Debbie Sevenpifer tabled a so-called “hospital improvement plan” in 2008. That plan that set the stage for downgrading the emergency rooms in hospitals in Fort Erie and Port Colborne to urgent care centres and ultimately lays plans for consolidating many other acute care services in the west St. Catharines hospital to be opened about a year from now.
Since then, a number of voices in the region, including this publishing NAL and writing a weekly column for Niagara This Week and its Fort Erie Post and Port Colborne Leader editions) have argued that the only real solution for south Niagara residents is a health system and new hospital of their own. Port Colborne Mayor Vance Badawey and his council have already gone so far over the past three years of working toward a system of primary and acute care services for the southern tier.
So it is good to learn that Kevin Smith, who reports to the province’s Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care and will soon be unveiling his recommendations on what should be done to improve hospital services here, is apparently seriously looking at the options of a new hospital and separate health system body for south Niagara. It also sounds promising to learn that Smith feels the cost of a new hospital is reasonable given how much it would likely cost to continue maintaining and upgrading older hospitals in the south end.
Niagara At Large invites readers to share their ideas and views on this news in the comment boxes below. We want to know what you and your neighbours in communities across the southern tier think. Please remember that we only post comments by people who share their real first and last names with them.
Niagara At Large 
Sounds to me as tho Kevin Smith, a real organizer for sure , will one way or another make things as ship shape as Hamilton’s e.g. St. Joseph’s down town and the St. Joseph’s ambulatory hospital in Stoney Creek , which my husband had the good fortune to visit recently.
Gracia Janes
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Maybe Mr. Smith has driven from Fort Erie or Port Colborne to the new St. Catharines hospital site and figured out what we in the south already knew- the distances/traffic are too great.
Here’s a hypothetical question? If South Niagara was offered a new hospital, where would be an ideal location?
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This is likened to closing the Barn Door after the animals have all escaped !!
Lulling the public into a false sense of security !!!
Where will the money come from ????????????
The elected Idiots still make these decisions!!
Were they wrong ????
They can’t admit it or backtrack !!!
Until they are turfed out it wont happen !!!
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Do we really need a new hospital here? Douglas Memorial is old, but beautiful, Why can’t we put money into fixing up this hospital, rather than building new? As far as having our own separarte system here in South Niagara…great idea!!! Will we get the millions back that the provincial government stole from Douglas Memorial and all of our equipment that was seized?
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While this sounds promising, we must remember this is more lip service from another bureaucrat. We have a province dedicated to reducing health care costs as its population ages. Talk about an uphill battle! Even if was decided tomorrow, it would be at least 5 years before it becomes reality. What happens until then?
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Why not re-open the closed services at Port Colborne and Fort Erie? Let’s not spend more money for a building.
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I see an even greater problem on the horizon. The money will undoubtedly come from a public (Ont govt) private (consortium of business/lenders/bankers) partenership. This will cost us three times the cost of a govt built hospital and after 30 years of collecting rents plus interest on investment, parking fees, and other sorces of funds, we can then buy the (need to repare) bulding at market price. Good deal for them but not for our families over the next decades.
There will be a confrontation upcoming between (lets make a deal) Mayor Martin and Port Colborne’s mayor. Nothing like a good confrontation to keep the lowly serfs busy.
What a grand deal!
How come our Mayor Martin is not on board with Port Colborne? How come our council has never asked for expropration money from the province for exproprating (taken without due payment) the hospital Fort Erians (with Dr. Douglas money) and our donations built and maintained even adding an emergency section.
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I agree with the problematic horizon position. A private partnership would be a bad, expensive deal. Private dollars and insurance companies are dying to get into health care to reap profits and turn Canada into Harpersville or U.S North, same thing.
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I guess we do look like a bunch of nay-sayers to some, but kudos to those commentators who have the sense and experience NOT to leap up and down with glee at the suggestion of a Niagara South hospital. I confess I’m puzzled and disappointed that most southern tier mayors are rushing to play into the hands of McGuinty’s P3 scam. The timing is rather suspect; with Minister of Health Deb Matthews’ imminent announcement (Monday) on changes to Ontario healthcare (read: more cuts), is Kevin Smith quietly letting us know that his hands will be so tied that any hope for better hospital services in South Niagara will have to depend on turning to a public/private partnership via Infrastructure Ontario? Sure, some doctors will love the idea of a nice new playground with all the newest expensive toys, but most of us down this way believe that we’re entitled to reasonably accessible hospital services without having to pay for them twice over, through big property tax increases — not to mention campaign donations. Our southern mayors need to take a really close look at the “deal” the NHS signed on to for the St. Catharines Hospital — recalling the fact that mayors of St. Catharines, Niagara Falls and Welland were told that a P3 hospital was a “take it or leave it” arrangement. Let’s wait and see how that works out for the residents of north Niagara. In the meantime, let’s refuse to be equally bullied by the McGuinty government. And let’s hope Dr. Smith is going to give us concrete suggestions that can be implemented without incurring debt for the next generation.
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Glenn Hutton: I believe that the Council of the Town of Fort Erie has given you your answer as to why Mayor Martin is not on board with Port Colborne’s mayor. Let’s get all the facts and make sure we are heading in the right direction before we jump on the first parade float.
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