Healthcare

In My Discussion With Residents I Hear Health Care Is Their Number One Priority.

York Region’s hospital funding workshop on January 29, 2009 highlighted a number of community needs, concerns and solutions.

We need to find a compromise until we break this ideological log jam about how these projects are funded, because healthcare is a critical part of our community infrastructure. I don’t disagree that this is primarily a provincial responsibility, but the reality is that many of the projects under way and those needed to respond to the growth in York Region would not or will not take place were it not for the funding provided or requested from the region.

These are very real needs we face every day so I am offering to work with a committee to resolve the provincial capital funding gap confronting our hospitals as was recommended by Mayor Scarpetti. I believe development charges should include hospital capital funding needs just like any other community infrastructure requirement and in fact I have already met once with the Minister Watson, Minister of Municipal Affairs and Housing requesting this be done.

We need to build a partnership with the hospitals to press the provincial government for changes to the Development Charges Act so that growth and new residents help to pay for the added burden they place on our hospitals, just like our roads, our pipes, our pools and recreational facilities.

It doesn’t matter how anyone wants to interpret this, but my intention is that at the end of the day our residents need not pay a penny more in property taxes after this decision to support our hospital than they would have before it. I know it can be done.

At the same time we need show our hospitals that we do recognize and support their position and that we should collectively put as much energy toward solving the long term problem as we do dealing with our more immediate needs.

We have been successful in correcting the unfairness of GTA Pooling. We now need to advance the funding concerns of our hospitals, until then, we can not abandon this critical community service. A funding gap inevitably leads to a service gap.