Riverside Health Care Facilities Inc. has received word the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care will provide a total grant of up to $688,026 to help cover renovation costs at La Verendrye hospital.
“It’s definitely good news,” said Riverside CEO Wayne Woods said Friday morning.
“We’ve had those projects before the ministry since about a year ago,” he noted. “They’re definitely something we need as part of the Phase IV renovations, particularly the boilers and the generator.”
The ministry will provide a grant of up to $243,182 to support a $324,242 project to replace two boilers and a generator.
A second grant of up to $232,500 will be used towards an elevator upgrade project. The total cost of this is estimated at $310,000.
Woods noted this isn’t for the main elevator but the smaller ones near the administrative wing.
“There’s a couple of older ones that I think are 40 or 50 years old. We can’t even order parts for them anymore,” he remarked.
And a third grant of up to $212,344 will help cover costs of a $283,125 project to replace the roof on the 1978 wing. Woods noted this is the west wing, where acute care patients, for example, receive treatment.
This financial support accounts for about 75 percent of the cost of these individual projects.
Meanwhile, Woods said Riverside administration and architects continue to fine-tune the blueprints for the $3.8-million Phase IV renovation project.
He added the shovel hopefully will be in the ground by the late summer or early fall.
Phase IV renovations include an expansion and enhancement to the emergency department, waiting room, diagnostic imaging department, and surgical services.
It also will provide the permanent location for the dialysis unit, as well as a new and improved chemotherapy room.
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