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Home My WebLink AboutTimes-Advocate, 1979-11-07, Page 21 (2)• • • fi imes _ voca e Serving South Huron, North Middlesex Times- Advocate, November 7, 1979 County protected & North tambton Since 1873 Page 1 A Update hospital grants bylaw By ALICE GIBB County council has passed a new bylaw to update their method of establishing hospital grants - a bylaw they hope will protect them in the future. Council will now pay a grant up to a maximum of 37.5 per cent of the paid provincial subsidy for any provincially approved building project at any • public hospital in the county, provided no grant paid to one institution shall exceed 25 per cent of the total ap- proved project cost. In effect the new bylaw says if the province won't put their funds in a hospital building project, then the county won't either. This protects the county from having to fund hospital renovation projects ap- proved by the province, but not funded by the province. Also, with the new bylaw, the county no longer needs the approval of the four other county hospitals when funding a building program at the other public hospital in the county. Bill Hanly, Huron County clerk -treasurer, said the executive committee's concern with the former bylaw was that the province might feel "If I don't have to pay for something, then I may be pretty free with my approval." The current bylaw safeguards the county from this possibility. Reeve Eldrid Simmons of Exeter expressed concern over the new bylaw, saying he's afraid smaller hospitals already aren't getting the same share of funding that goes to larger hospitals. He said, "When we're collecting money fro#n taxpayers, we have as much Plan old Church as new library , By ALICE GIBB Construction will be starting soon on the new headquarters of the Huron County library after county council accepted tenders for renovations of the former Bethel Pentecostal Church. Goderich. Council purchased the church building last spring as the future Huron County Library headquarters. A tender of $87,810 was accepted from Bratt Con- struction Co. Ltd. of Hyde Park. The next lowest tender for the renovations was submitted at a cost of $97,393 by Frank Van Bussel and Sons, RR 3, Lucan. When the church was purchased by council last spring. they were told a number of renovations would be necessary `to would the building up to the required standards for a public facility The building was pur- chased for $70,000 and it was hoped that with the renovations, the total cost to the county would be $100.000. That figure has now *isen to $169,000, if a number of items are deleted from the renovation The price of constructing a loader conveyor for books will 1* an additional $3,500 over and above the tender price quoted for renovations. Although the construction costs are higher than originally proposed, the architect's fee will remain the same, at $5,670. The firm Snider. Reichard and March of Waterloo are supervising renovations to the building. Among the items which were deleted were con- struction of an asphalt driveway, the front entry and metal soffits, eaves and downspouts. The library headquarters will remain in their present Lighthouse street location until renovations at the former Church are com- pleted. The present lease expires at the end of December. but the landlords have agreed to extend it. The library is presently paying $1,000 a month rent at the Lighthouse Street location. Reeve Ervin Sillery of Tuckersmith township, past chairman of council's property committee, told council the committee pretty well had to accept the lowest tender since everything was in order. Another council member asked why no local con- tractors had bid on the renovation contract. Clerk -treasurer Bill Hanly said a bid bond was required with the contract, and local contractors 'indicated they had enough work ahead where bid bonds weren't necessary. There are now 28 branches in the Huron County Library system, now in its 12th year of operation Circulation in 1978 was 367,093 well up from 1977. One of the main problems with the present library headquarters has been the lack of storage space for books circulating in the county system. right to have a hospital funded by the county whether the provincial government funds it or not." Mr. Simmons said the' Exeter hospital was for- tunate they had their own finances to fund a recent building program at the hospital. When the province turned down their request for financial assistance, they went ahead with renovations using a grant from the county and their own funds. The province did con- tribute two-thirds of the cost of building programs at Goderich, Clinton and Wingham hospitals with the county funding 25 per cent of the remaining costs and the local municipality seven per cent of the cost in each case. Mr. Simmons said he's concerned when the county hospitals run out of money in the future, and the ministry of health doesn't fund them, or the county, then the hospitals will get in "a delapidated condition." Simmons added, "I'm afraid we're looking at a back door entrance to closing a lot of these little hospitals." Eileen Palmer. Goderich said she sees the present situation in hospital funding more as a move to bring district health councils into the area. The reeve, a strong advocate of health councils, said because of the provincial hospital funding situation, she sees more need to have district health councils. since they'd have more el t in dealing with the pros' ce. In othe council business, member approved the hiring oanother public health nurse to work in the north Of the county. Dr. Brian Lynch, the Medical Officer of Health, reported the public health nurse in the Wingham area was carrying a caseload of 6,588 and .spends 10days of each month on home care alone. The board of health report said "The distance from Wingham to the farthest end of Ashfield is 30 miles, so part of the district has vir- tually no nursing service because the Wingham area nurse has little time to visit the Ashfield and West Wawanosh Township." The nurse's savary will be from $14-$17,000 annually, depending on experience with the province funding 50 per cent of the cost. The board of health also recommended that their staff should avoid smoking in situations where it wouldn't support the objections of the health unit's program. • Eileen Palmer, chairman of the health board, said there was some concern that - TOWN HALL PENDULUM WEIGHT GUESSING WINNER MAIN ST f r� Zamptell JEWELLER Shown determining the official weight of the Old Town Hall clock pendulum are Jay Campbell and Jim Darling, Mrs. Von Duyn, 127 Mill St. Exeter will receive a quartz clock from Campbell's for her win- ning guess of 43 lbs. 7 ozs. The actual weight of the pendulum was 44 lbs. staff members were smoking in public schools while carrying, out their duties. She said the com- mittee hopes the staff will follow their recom- mendation. SUNSHINE KIDS ENJOY HALLOWEEN — Nursery School enjoyed a Halloween party, Matthew Godbolt, Rochelle Geoffrey, Taro Glavin, Jenny Mclean, Jennifer Glavin, I ;, Members of the Sunshine Kids Wednesday morning. Back, loft, Edwards, Alyssa Mitchell, Mork Ro Glavin, Robinson, semary Koren Simon Dinney and HeatherGroy. Front, Melonie Phillips, Suzanne Steciuk, Greg Crandlemire, Amy Johns, Brenyn Baynhom, DanielSpears, Jeff Bowen, Eugene Boersmo, Elaine Heywood, Fiona Kirkby and Benji Glanville.T-A photo • Exeter's Nerve E R D CW S Vi ORE EX'�tE 451 M P1kON E 235-1A 3 US114OR1HOF MONEY IRN tu R JnnetCoword and Sandy Rowere�dtoa n . ir new store ounce too pening o1 theeen wear (tomorrow) to Wh y'hre plepedto feature a - dan mo quality c ddrens clothing torn ma h: tersch °s; t°mO'Sh°nter' et. Kdbec ono D°ntmovr opening nd also to be Sure to drop in and see us during midnight madness. manyofser s. SPECI C16x . Sizes Infants to6X OPENING SPECIALS eFF 74 t% f L �v5j A FEw OF 0 'THESE ARE goys CorGird V TduToY est Salts Is C° byTarr'OSh rShat�t°� atter Spiess 98 S,:es?998 sReg�W Sires 4-bx Sripssl9 q8 RQNOVI 1798 ,2 99 Re NOW S qt" Baby Cord (woo.S 20010 °FF Reg NOVW s � 79S Complete Ling of BABY SUPPLIES also toys and books 46x 20 N1 WS 20 .A w °1° • NP`1S • GI-oNES • 9N0W SU1� Boys & GiT1s A11 IS 20°10 OFF S Shop early for Christmas and Save See. our many MIDNIGHT MADNESS SPECIALS Fri. 6 - Midnight