St. Joe's sound warning
Mental hospital faces axe if heritage talks mire project starts
June 08, 2010
Carmela Fragomeni
The Hamilton Spectator
http://www.thespec.com/News/Local/article/783993
St. Joseph's Healthcare officials warn a new mental health hospital may never go ahead if city council gets bogged down on heritage issues.
St. Joe's plans call for bids to be completed by June 30 and a shovel in the ground by January in order to meet Infrastructure Ontario timelines. But council could cause a serious delay by insisting on a further review of heritage buildings on the former Hamilton Psychiatric Hospital grounds.
The Ontario Realty Corporation (ORC), which manages real estate for the province -- and owns the land -- has given approval to demolish three significant heritage buildings. The city was originally told the buildings would be preserved. And a 2008 city heritage assessment concluded the buildings should be kept and reused.
Although government approval and funding is already in place for the new hospital, the delay could derail the whole project according to Rebecca Repa, St. Joe's vice-president of redevelopment.
"If we get off our schedule ... and have to wait, we'll be out of the queue (of approved infrastructure projects). That's our concern -- that we can't start in January ... our anxiety is it won't go forward."
Repa said by losing its place in the line for funding, St. Joe's could see the province putting the mental health hospital on the backburner and moving other projects to the top of the list for redevelopment.
"Falling out of timelines is very negative," said Kevin Smith, St. Joseph's Health System CEO. "When we've seen resistance (to a project), the (provincial) attention goes to where you can get results."
Repa and Smith were among a delegation to The Hamilton Spectator's editorial board yesterday.
Smith would like tomorrow's city council meeting to refer the matter back to its planning committee so it can reconsider its request for a more detailed review of the demolition plans. This would allow the city, the ORC and Infrastructure Ontario to "have a conversation" about what should be on the site, Smith said. "We hope we can find a design that works."
St. Joe's wants to respect the city's heritage needs, but doesn't want to lose the project, said Dr. David Higgins, president of St. Joseph's Healthcare Hamilton.
Smith said St. Joe's is open to including the heritage buildings and would love to see a model that includes heritage in the plans, but it needs the project to proceed before the province loses interest.
Redevelopment plans for a new mental health hospital at Fennell and West 5th were unveiled in 2008 to replace its current Centre for Mountain Health Services. The new facility will include outpatient services to serve 2.5 million people in the Hamilton area, and research departments. It is expected to have 305 beds and is slated for completion in 2013.