Gan budget talks to include funding for Kingston hospitals

About a year ago, Gananoque council said no to a request for a committed investment to the University Hospitals Kingston Foundation.

Gananoque was the only municipality in the area to say no to the annual funding to Kingston hospitals.

But with public displeasure from that decision, and with another request made by the foundation, council circled back to the matter at Tuesday's council meeting and said yes, unanimously, to refer the request to upcoming budget deliberations for consideration.

Mayor John Beddows still isn’t firmly comfortable with council passing on the extra cost to residents, and still believes that fundamentally, it’s the responsibility of the province to support the health needs of municipalities.

Like many municipal leaders, Beddows feels the province is pushing health-care responsibilities to municipalities.

However, the community he leads wanted their mayor and council to reconsider their position. So, they did.

At last week’s public information session at the Lou Jeffries, Gananoque and TLTI Recreation Centre, a presentation was given by Dr. David Pichora, President and CEO of UHKF.

Pichora outlined the provincially mandated funding model of hospitals in Ontario, which indicates that new hospital builds are funded 90 per cent by the province and 10 per cent by fundraising, including municipal contributions. All new capital medical equipment, including MRI and PT machines, are covered entirely through fundraising. The Ministry of Health will not pay these costs.

Questions from the public ranged from how to get on a wait list for a doctor, to what are the roles of a nurse practitioner, and what would be the tax increases be, on average, to fund a $200,000 physician recruitment grant and a $75,000 annual contribution to the hospital.

A show of hands also indicated that the majority of the attendees were in support of an additional tax levy to support UHKF annually.

For the average household in Gananoque in 2024, the addition of a $75,000 hospital levy would add $20 to their annual tax bill.

With another show of hands, the majority of the attendees were supportive of additional tax increases to fund increased physician recruitment and nurse practitioners. For the $100,000 additional tax levy for doubling the physician recruitment program, the average annual household share would be $25.

Council will decide during budget deliberations whether to include these additional costs in the 2025 operating budget.

Gananoque has donated $333,000 to Kingston Health Sciences Centre (KHSC) since 2003 to support projects like the Cancer Centre expansion, but hasn’t previously committed to annual funding.

Keith Dempsey is a Local Journalism Initiative reporter who works out of the Brockville Recorder and Times. The Local Journalism Initiative is funded by the Government of Canada.