BLIND RIVER—The board of health for Algoma Public Health (APH) has given its approval to engage with Public Health Sudbury and Districts (PHSD) in making a request to the province to study the feasibility of a voluntary merger of the two public health agencies.
“Wednesday, at our board meeting, the board passed a motion to request funding for a feasibility study to be conducted to look at volunteer amalgamation with PHSD,” Sally Hagman, mayor of Blind River and a member of the APH board of health told The Expositor.
The province is requesting health units look at potential volunteer amalgamations to take place.
“I think this is a positive way to look at it,” said Mayor Hagman. “We want to make sure we have a strong public health agency. If funding for a feasibility study is approved and funded and it shows that it would be feasible for our two public health units to work together that would be a good thing.”
“Yes, we are in favour of merging with (PHSD) because of the geography involved,” said Mayor Hagman. “We would not be merging with a health unit in southern Ontario.” She pointed out “the Sudbury and Algoma boards have always been a good fit. I have (recently) attended a meeting of the PHSD and (PHSD) medical officer of health Dr. Penny Sutcliffe attended one of our meetings.”
At a PHSD board of health meeting earlier this month, the board passed a motion to support a request for funding from the province to hire a consultant to have a feasibility study done on a merger of the two health units. With approval having now been given by the Algoma board as well, the medical officers of both health units will make a request to the Ministry of Health to fund this study.
