Five-year delay on health centre
Red-flagged building pushed back despite crumbling foundations
April Hudson
Northern News Services
Thursday, October 22, 2015
LIIDLII KUE/FORT SIMPSON
Fort Simpson will not break ground on a new health centre until 2022 at the earliest, according to the Northwest Territories' new budget.
Fort Simpson's health centre will remain in its current building until 2022-23. - April Hudson/NNSL photo
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The budget, which was tabled in legislature earlier this month, pushed back the health centre's construction to the 2022-23 budget year. Prior to that, it had been scheduled for 2017.
Fort Simpson's current health centre was constructed in the early 1970s. Nahendeh MLA Kevin Menicoche said a government engineering report from 2009 showed the structure's cement foundations are crumbling on the west end. After that report was released, the health centre was red-flagged by the territorial government.
"That means if there were some additional moneys, or based on the planning study and priority level, it would make it into the capital budget," Menicoche said.
However, the government failed to complete the planning study on time and securing a location for the health centre also caused delays - although not enough to merit it being pushed back five additional years, Menicoche said.
"The planning study was in the budget but they kept deferring it and deferring it ... Now, it's to be completed by January or February 2016," he said. "There was no need to delay (the project) five years."
Menicoche said when he found out the health centre had been bumped five years, he addressed the Priorities and Planning Committee for support moving the project back to 2017.
"We got support from all 11 non-cabinet ministers," he said.
"But (the government) said, 'No, we have other priorities in the next assembly - we're not going to be moving anything around.' "
The Department of Health and Social Services did not respond to requests for comment. However, in the legislative assembly, Minister Tom Beaulieu said there will be a second phase to the planning study after February 2016, whereby schematic designs will be looked at by the peer review committee. That is expected to be completed by the fall of 2016.
At that point, Beaulieu said, the committee will discuss the capital need in Fort Simpson for a new health centre in context with other capital needs across the territory. That step will likely involve community consultation, he said.
Menicoche said he is glad to hear public consultation is planned, citing past building snafus such as Fort Providence Health Centre's morgue and Hay River Hospital's long-term care beds as reasons why communities need to see the floor plan.
"Community participation and consultation is important in developing such a huge structure," he said.
A request for comment sent to Cabinet communications yielded no response.
