Expect to hear some “righteous indignation” from local proponents of the Jubilee Home Replacement Project with the Saskatchewan Party re-elected.
That tactic was suggested during a project update by Graham Brown, president of the Lloydminster Concerned Citizens for Seniors Care Society, at the Rotary Club of Lloydminster lunch on Oct. 28.
Brown says his lobby group is using a two-pronged approach to get the project approved and is asking Rotarians to help raise awareness of the project.
“We’re going after the politicians and we’re now going to send the project up through the channel,” he said. “Then our next step is to write a letter to the CEO of Saskatchewan Health Authority and make sure he’s damn aware of this project coming up and start working on it now.”
Brown thinks it could take the new government three to four months to find a new health minister and bring him up to speed on Jubilee if a cabinet change occurs.
The proposal calls for the Saskatchewan Ministry of Health to replace and expand Jubilee with 180 LTC spaces including 80 specialty care spaces identified in a 2013 community health needs plan.
Saskatchewan has not built any new LTC spaces since 1985 when the original Jubilee Home was replaced with the same 50 spaces. Alberta has added 109 LTC spaces in recent years, but there will be a projected shortfall of 148 LTC spaces within 87 kilometres of Lloydminster by 2035.
“One of the things that came from the 2013 study was Lloydminster’s Saskatchewan residents are not getting the level of health care from Saskatchewan that the rest of the residents are getting,” said Brown.
“We’re asking to get up to the same level they provide across the rest of the province.”
Dr. Raff Sayeed who founded the seniors group with Rod Sellers in 2005 over the need for LTC spaces, says project advocates are too polite in Lloydminster.
“We have to stop being polite and stop being nice. The reason we have emergency waits is because we have no beds upstairs,” said Sayeed, referring to the Lloydminster Hospital.
Sayeed says another thing the seniors’ group discovered was local residents were being shipped two hours away even as far as Stettler for a bed.
“We need a little bit of righteous indignation to get people (politicians) moving (on Jubilee),” he said.
The Jubilee replacement proposal notes North Battleford has 18 LTC spaces per 1,000 people, Maidstone 19, while Lloydminster only has four.
“When you have a shortage of LTC spaces, it creates a shortage throughout the system right at the emergency department,” said Brown.
The Jubilee proposal would create a community of care for seniors without having to leave their community.
Paul Richer, chair of the Lloydminster and District Health Advisory Council, says Sask is allocating $250,000 to finance concepts and design plans for more LTC spaces in North Battleford, but none here in Lloyd.
“So it’s not that Saskatchewan is short of money, it just stops short of Maidstone,” said Richer.
Rotarian Robin Acton also thinks it’s time to stop pulling punches to get the Saskatchewan government moving on the project after years of lobbying for various healthcare issues.
“I’m with you Dr. Sayeed; we’ve got some righteous resignation,” said Acton.
“We want the same access to crappy healthcare that everybody else gets.”
Sayeed thinks Lloydminster’s City Hall needs to get moving as well, being a local power broker. However, Brown says Mayor Gerald Aalbers, who has been acclaimed in upcoming municipal election, is fully on side.
“We’ve really had the involvement of the mayor,” said Brown.
“He’s been pushing healthcare and for the first time in years, he had both health ministers here this past summer face to face. He’s really getting involved in the health file and that’s great.”
Brown says Aalbers estimates it could cost $500,000 per bed or $90 million for 180 spaces at Jubilee based on the comparative cost of the Northwest Community Lodge in Meadow Lake.
Sellers told Rotary the expansion at Pioneer Lodge, which created Pioneer House, was a collaborative funding effort between a local group and the Province of Alberta.
“I would suggest to our city fathers we do a collaborative effort of some kind to further this,” said Sellers.
“The only disappointment Graham in what you told us today, is they (Sask) are going to have another study.
“We know the needs. The study is just another delaying tactic.”
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