News from the Ontario Health Coalition, a Toronto-based advocacy group for preserving quality public health care
Posted September 19th, 2016 on Niagara At Large
The following note on this public meeting – just as a way of placing its purpose in some context – was prepared by NAL publisher Doug Draper –
The Welland Hospital Site, serving the Niagara City of Welland and neighbourning communities, including Wainfleet, Port Colborne, Fort Erie and southern reaches of Pelham and Thorold.
The Ontario Health Coalition’s Niagara chapter will be hosting a “Save Our Hospital” meeting in Niagara region’s southern tier community of Welland where concern remains high that what is left of the hospital services there are on death row.
The meeting, which is free and open to everyone, is scheduled for Wednesday, September 28th at 6:30 p.m. in the Community Room of Welland City Hall on 60 Main Street in that city.
Residents in Niagara’s southern tier have been expressing upset and anger over what has been happening to their hospitals for most of the years since the former provincial government of Mike Harris amalgamated of all the region’s hospitals (except for one in Grimsby) under the umbrella of a ‘Niagara Health System’ 16 years ago.
Since the amalgamation, hospitals in Fort Erie and Port Colborne have been larged shelled out and the Welland hospital has been teetering on the brink of no longer qualifying for hospital status while most of the heavy hospital services have been concentrated in a super hospital the Niagara Health System located in the north end of Niagara in west St. Catharines.
About four years ago, the NHS asked the mayors of Welland, Niagara Falls, Port Colborne , Fort Erie and Wainfleet to get together with Niagara’s regional government’s chair and decide on a site for another new hospital in the region’s southern tier.
For reasons that have never been made clear to the public, a site in the southwest end of Niagara Falls was chosen for this new hospital, which has yet to see a groundbreaking (if it ever really will given the lineup there is for new hospitals for municipalities in other regions of Ontario).
But even if all the reasons arrived at in a series closed-door meetings the mayors and regional chair held before announcing the Niagara Falls site, numerous people in living in the southern tier communities of Welland, Port Colborne and Wainfleet, at least, argue that this site is not truly accessible for many in south Niagara and does not make up for the Niagara Health System’s decision a decade ago to build the super hospital now operating in the region’s north end.
So the Ontario Health Coalition and its chapter group, the Niagara Health Coalition, are coming back to the region again to host yet another ‘Save Our Hospital’ meeting in Welland this coming September 28th.
Since Niagara At Large also has a good number of readers living in other parts of Ontario, here is the entire list of upcoming meetings the Coalition is hosting around the province.
Upcoming Local Health Coalition Meetings Across Ontario
Attend a meeting near you!
London Health Coalition Meeting, Monday September 19, 6:30 p.m., London Public Library (Central Branch), 251 Dundas St.
Ottawa Health Coalition Meeting, Monday September 19, 7 p.m., J.K. Wylie Boardroom, 233 Gilmour St.
Peterborough Health Coalition Meeting, Wednesday September 21, 4:30 p.m., Labour Council building, 246 Romaine St (at Alymer St)
Durham Health Coalition Meeting , Monday September 26, 7 p.m., Unifor Local 222, 1425 Phillip Murray Ave, Oshawa
Oxford Health Coalition Meeting, Tuesday September 27, 7 p.m., 70 Glenn Ave, Sweaburg, South-West Oxford
Stratford and Area Concerned Citizens’ Meeting, Wednesday September 28, 5 p.m., For details about location, please contact Haldie Wicke 519-275-0185
Welland Save Our Hospital Meeting, Wednesday September 28, 6:30 p.m., Welland City Hall (Community Room), 60 Main St.
Thunder Bay Health Coalition Meeting, Wednesday October 12, 5 p.m., United Way of Thunder Bay, 1006 – 715 Hewitson St.
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