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$1.25 GST included Serving the communities of Blyth and Brussels and northern Huron County Thursday, March 10, 2011
Volume 27 No. 10
4-H CLUBS - Pg. 12Huron 4-H Clubs giveout annual awards FESTIVAL - Pg. 26 Stratford Festival postsover $300,000 surplusLEGION- Pg. 11Brussels Legion hostspublic speaking competitionPublications Mail Agreement No. 40050141 Return Undeliverable Items to North Huron Publishing Company Inc., P.O. Box 152, BRUSSELS, ON N0G 1H0INSIDE THIS WEEK:
Spring is coming
That’s no rabbit and no hat
Marc Le Magician prepares to magically insert a playing card into a bottle on top of Hannah
Lindahl’s head. Lindahl, a Brookside Public School student, visited Blyth’s Memorial Hall,
where Marc put on his show on Friday, March 4. The show was organized by Blyth, Brookside,
Colborne, Turnberry, Wingham and East Wawanosh Public Schools using funds for cultural
studies. (Denny Scott photo)
Central Huron
considers new
OPP contract
Wingham and District Hospital
(WDH) and Listowel Memorial
Hospital (LMH) rank above the
provincial average in patient
satisfaction with overall care in the
emergency department and inpatient
care. LMH and WDH work together
as the Listowel Wingham Hospitals
Alliance (LWHA).
The website: www.myhospital
care.ca is posting new patient
experience indicators and data,
giving Ontarians an opportunity to
learn more about how their local
hospitals are performing by location,
type of care, indicator or hospital
name. The level of patient
satisfaction at Listowel and
Wingham can be compared to
most hospitals in the province of
Ontario.
LMH and WDH are rated better
than average for overall care in
2008-09 and 2009-10 for emergency
department care as well as inpatient
care. In addition, patient satisfaction
with emotional support, information
and education, and continuity and
transition were rated above average
for both years.
“Listowel and Wingham Hospitals
have participated in patient
satisfaction surveys for many years,”
says Liz Phelan, vice-president of
Clinical Services for the LWHA.
“Excellent ratings such as these
reflect the compassion and caring of
our staff and physicians.”
“We are justifiably proud of these
results and will continue to work on
improving our quality and
performance,” says Karl Ellis,
president and CEO of LWHA. “Our
Quality Improvement Plans for the
next fiscal year will be available on
our website www.lwha.ca on April
1. Publishing these results along
with our future improvement plans
reflect our commitment to quality
and demonstrate our transparency to
our community.”
Patients of LMH or WDH may
receive a survey in the mail asking
for specific feedback on their
experiences while in hospital. All
patients are encouraged to reply to
these surveys as this feedback
provides the hospitals with an
opportunity to learn more about how
services can be improved.
As the days grow longer and the
drive home from work is sunny and
bright, it’s Daylight Savings Time
again.
It’s nearly St. Patrick’s Day and
the spring is almost upon us. A sign
that there is light at the end of the
oh-so-long winter tunnel is finally
here.
On March 13, at 2 a.m. it’s time
for us to spring forward and turn our
clocks ahead one hour.
Central Huron Council is
considering upgrading their current
agreement with the Ontario
Provincial Police (OPP) to a Section
10 contract for the next five years.
Council received a presentation
from OPP contract policing analyst
Sgt. Kevin Hummel where he laid
out the benefits that the municipality
would receive from an upgraded
contractual agreement as opposed to
the “5.1” agreement the
municipality currently has.
The current agreement provides
the basic policing services required
by law, but with a Section 10, the
OPP would have a slightly increased
presence in Central Huron, as well
as more power to enforce bylaws.
Central Huron received the
presentation, but wasn’t required to
make a decision on the future of
policing for the municipality at the
Monday night meeting. The
proposed contract will stand as is for
six months from the March 7
presentation date, after that,
additional discussions would have to
take place and a contractual
restructuring would have to take
place.
“This is not a sell job,” Hummel
said on Monday night. “This is an
information session on a Section 10
agreement for Central Huron.”
Hummel said that while there are
subtle differences between the two
agreements, the two major points are
that with a Section 10 contract there
would be an additional position
(Detachment Administration Clerk)
and added coverage in the event of
provincial service usage.
Provincial service usage is when
officers are deployed out of their
detachment by the province due to a
large event or disaster situation such
as the unrest in Caledonia or the G20
summit in Toronto. While the
municipality doesn’t pay wages for
those officers when deployed
outside of the municipality, under a
Section 10 contract, additional
coverage would be provided, up
from 10 per cent to 50 per cent.
Hummel, however, implored
councillors to compare the 5.1 and
Section 10 agreements with the
provincial service usage omitted.
When doing so, as Councillor Alison
Lobb noted, the financial numbers
were nearly identical (just $1,000
apart on a contract well over $1
million)) but under a Section 10
contract, policing and security in
Central Huron would be enhanced.
There were additional off-book
costs that would be associated with
entering into a contract, including
the formation of a police services
board that the municipality would
have governance over.
How involved the board would be
in the day-to-day activities of the
OPP, Hummel said, would be up to
council.
He said that some boards send
representatives to multiple
conferences and meet monthly, but
that wasn’t required. There would
have to be a minimum of three
members, but other than that, the
municipality could dictate the
majority of the board’s activities.
In addition, when Lobb asked
about costs associated with a board,
Hummel said it would be
speculation if he were to begin citing
costs. He said that every police
services board costs a different
amount and it would depend on how
involved council wanted the board to
be in the municipality’s policing.
Councillor Burkhard Metzger
boiled it down to the fact that under
a Section 10 contract, there would
be a closer working relationship
between the OPP and the
municipality, whereas under the
current agreement, the two parties
could be seen as working on parallel
lines.
Hummel didn’t completely agree
with Metzger, but did say that the
OPP would have an increased
presence under the new contract and
would be able to provide better
policing to Central Huron.
There were some concerns with
the current agreement, however, as
Lobb, as well as Councillor Brian
Barnim, cited certain circumstances
where loud partying and noise
violations, normally under the
By Shawn Loughlin
The Citizen
Continued on page 7
Local hospitals score well
in patient satisfaction