Planning for expansion of the Eagle Ridge Hospital emergency department was started under the former BC Liberal government and now that there is a new sheriff in town, we want to know more details about how the project will be funded.
It was never made clear in any public statements when the original expansion was announced in the spring of 2017 that two parcels of land would have to be sold to help pay for the $27.6-million expansion, and for many, including Port Moody council, the news came as a shock.
The city's official community plan had never envisioned more housing on that site so a plan to have it rezoned for more than 400 housing units in towers and low-rise residential was an unpleasant surprise.
Of course, it is possible to justify the land sale, as Fraser Health has noted; hospitals are now built with towers and, thus, don’t need to have a sprawling layout; and if selling that land is the only way to fast-track much-needed expansion, that can be defended, too.
But Port Moody has to take a broader view and consider the pros and cons for such a development. For now, its planning advisory committee has said No to the preliminary application, prompting Fraser Health to take a step back and reconsider its options.
It was not unusual for the former BC Liberal government to ask other jurisdictions to put a little skin in the game to fund construction of public buildings. School districts were also encouraged to dispose of unused assets to raise funds for new capital, and School District 43 has done this in Port Moody and Coquitlam to help pay for new schools and a new administration building.
Whether public land should be sold to pay for important capital assets is a debate that could fairly be held now that Fraser Health is stepping back from its plan.
And we wonder what Premier John Horgan would say about all this since it was he who raised concerns that land on Burke Mountain was sold too cheaply in a fire sale to balance the books in 2013/’14.
Then-premier Christy Clark denied those allegations, stating that the province got fair value because the land was purchased in a competitive bidding process and the government posted a surplus.
Still, it would be worthwhile for the current NDP government to state clearly how it wants public assets to be used and if it believes hospitals should be funded through the sale of public land.
