Health board curtails its public meetings

Health board curtails its public meetings
By Dan Hilborn, Burnaby NOW assistant editor
Published Oct. 9, 2002

Fewer board meetings and more open houses planned by Fraser Health Authority
Monthly public board meetings will likely become a thing of the past for the Fraser Health Authority board of directors.
"It is not the intention of the board to have open public meetings on a frequent basis," FHA CEO Bob Smith said during a conference call with reporters last Wednesday.
"However, it is our intention to have consultations on a frequent basis.
"My desire is to find ways in which community interest can be engaged and by that, I don't mean an engagement in arguing over how many hospital beds are operating," Smith said. "And so, I think town halls are very much a part of our future."
The comments come one month after the FHA board's first public meeting since it was formally established by the provincial government late last year. At that meeting, Smith and government- appointed directors were repeatedly shouted down by an estimated 100 protesters, most of whom were in attendance to protest plans to reduce services at Delta Hospital.
The Surrey meeting had no agenda, no resolutions and no debate among board members, and instead focused on 'presentations' from administrators describing the planned changes in the health care system.
Smith said the health board will hold its next board meeting in the first week of November, and a decision has yet to be made whether or not to open that meeting to the public.

MORE CUTS NEEDED: SMITH

The budget cutting is proceeding, but the Fraser Health Authority is still only about halfway to its cost saving goals for this year, health region CEO Bob Smith confirmed last week.
"This year the target was $50 million. At the moment, we're better than halfway (to reaching that goal), but we're running into some difficulties in making all the changes we saw as possible."
The cuts are just the first phase of a three-year plan intended to eliminate $140 million from the total $1.4 billion budget of the health region. Under proposals outlined last week, the region intends to lay off up to 1,600 of its total 20,000 employee workforce.
While the recent elimination of 18 senior positions and other administrative changes will save about $3 million, the management restructuring proposal is intended to be cost neutral, Smith said. Among the new costs are the appointment of an internal auditor and the hiring of in-house legal counsel.
The new management structure will be divided into three groups: core services (for hospitals and other medical delivery systems); support services (communications, finance and human resources); and strategic services (facilities, capital planning and revenue generation).
Among the most visible changes is the creation of three new chief operating officer positions, and 10 new health service administrators - who will be responsible for all service delivery in a smaller identifiable community.
"As far as I'm concerned, and as long as I'm here as the CEO, this is the structure we'll work with," he said. "We need to send a message of strong and stable leadership in the organization.
"You know as well as I do that the financial imperative of the health system is of a significant magnitude. It's not going to go away in the next couple of months and I need strong leaders and I need them to support a strong workforce.
"In the short run we are really an organization going through a remarkable amount of consolidation. One of the benefits, I hope, will be the ability of patients to access the range of services a little easier," Smith said. "This takes down the walls of community services and acute services and streamlines their relationships with us."