CollingwoodToday welcomes letters to the editor at [email protected] or via our website. Please include your full name, daytime phone number and address (for verification of authorship, not publication).The following letter was submitted by the Collingwood General and Marine Hospital's communications staff on behalf of the hospital's president/CEO, Mike Lacroix, and the board of directors, Barry Goodwin.
As chair of the board of directors and president/CEO of the Collingwood General and Marine Hospital (CGMH), we would like to update the communities we serve on our efforts to develop a new state-of-the-art hospital for South Georgian Bay.
First, the need for a new hospital is crystal clear. Our current facility is old, cramped, and inadequate for the rapidly growing population in South Georgian Bay. Despite the efforts of the dedicated team at CGMH, keeping up with the current demand for services in our existing building is challenging. We need a new hospital now to support the needs of today and the growing needs of tomorrow.
Second, our plan to build a new hospital on a greenfield site is solid and makes business sense. Rebuilding the hospital on Hume Street would be much more expensive, take much longer, and result in a hospital that would be very difficult to update down the road, when the need is even higher.
A fresh start in a new modern building simply makes sense. It will get us a hospital that will serve our needs for decades and gives us the flexibility to expand in the future, protecting both provincial and local investments.
We have been offered through donation, thirty acres of land on Poplar Sideroad for our new hospital site – a location which would benefit the entire South Georgian Bay region we serve. Its placement within a proposed innovative health and wellness village is exciting, and we eagerly anticipate the progression of that project, which has the potential to complement our own hospital development proposal.
Third, the Province of Ontario is nearing the end of its review of our detailed plan that we submitted in March 2023, making the case to build our new hospital on Poplar Sideroad rather than Hume Street. We hope to receive approval for this plan soon, so that we can move forward in partnership with Infrastructure Ontario to select a firm for the final design and construction of our new hospital.
Fourth, all the municipalities we serve (Blue Mountains, Clearview, Collingwood, Grey Highlands, Wasaga Beach) stand behind the new hospital plan, which recommends the Poplar Sideroad location.
In addition, our municipalities understand the urgent need for additional hospital space to deliver healthcare services that support our growing communities and are eager for swift action by the province.
We know that each municipality’s council is deeply invested in securing a new hospital for their citizens and we will continue working with all mayors and their teams to achieve this goal.
It is important that we all stay united on the big picture here – designing and building a new modern hospital to meet the healthcare needs of our communities, now, and into the future. The South Georgian Bay region is in desperate need of a new hospital and CGMH is dedicated to making this happen. Let's work together to get that done.
Barry Goodwin and Mike Lacroix
CGMH board chair and president/CEO
