In the Lower Mainland, when new hospitals are built, or when existing, aging hospitals are updated and expanded, our provincial government picks up the entire tab, thanks in part to the taxes we pay here in central B.C.
However, for the new $1,579 billion expansion of Prince George’s University Hospital of Northern British Columbia, local ratepayers will be asked to pay for it twice. First, through their provincial taxes. Secondly, from their property tax rate at the Regional District of Fraser Fort-George (RDFFG), which is on the hook for about 23.1 per cent of that expense, or $365 million.
We should be thankful for the work done by our Regional District Health Board (a sub-board of the RDFFG) that negotiated with the province to reduce our share of the contribution down from the original $631 million, as normally our regional district is responsible for 40 per cent of all capital costs associated with the hospitals in our region.
Regional district residents – people living in Prince George, Mackenzie, Valemount, McBride and rural points between – will have to dig deep to cover that $365 million contribution toward the hospital’s new patient care tower. Most of that digging will happen in Prince George, as our residents make up the majority (almost 70 per cent) of the property tax base of the RDFFG.
This isn’t right. Not when Surrey’s new $2.88-billion hospital is being paid for entirely by the province. Not when the new cancer centre planned for Burnaby is being fully funded by the provincial government. Their residents aren’t being asked to pay twice.
There’s also an issue of transparency here. When the $365 million was announced, there was no mention of the process that led to that level of spending.
Only through Coun. Brian Skakun, one of the four Prince George city council members who sits on the board of the RDFFG, did taxpayers learn that the decision was made behind closed doors before going to a planned formal vote in September.
Yes, Regional District Hospital Board chair Joan Atkinson said, Skakun is correct. But, she noted, he wasn’t “authorized to speak” about it.
But Skaken represents Prince George and he’s authorized by voters to speak up to protect taxpayers’ dollars. He didn’t violate any rules about revealing what was discussed in camera; he simply pointed out that the announcement was premature.
Besides, this discussion should not have been held in camera in the first place. Hospital expansion funding doesn’t meet any of the requirements for a meeting to be closed to taxpayers.
It’s also important to note the fact that our hospital, which already serves as the only critical care facility in the upper half of the province, will now serve people living across the north with the new surgical tower. But only we will pay for it. It seems that the provincial government has forgotten that it is responsible to provides healthcare to the entire province.
Regional districts were originally developed to help isolated, unorganized rural communities have a say with a new form of local government. That has worked out.
But along the way, the decision was made to download provincial costs to regional districts – except for those in the Lower Mainland, which is how Prince George, as part of the Northern Health Authority region, now ends up on the hook for $365 million for the hospital surgical tower while Lower Mainland communities have theirs paid for 100 per cent.
As we head into a provincial election campaign, this is an opportunity for political parties to demonstrate that they have the best interests of the voters in the northern half of the province at heart.
They could do this by pledging, if elected or re-elected, to cover the entire cost of the surgical tower so that we will have a modernized hospital (without paying for twice).
Have your say on this with a letter: [email protected].
