6- The Oakville Beaver Weekend, Saturday July 5, 2008 www.oakvillebeaver.com The Oakville Beaver 467 Speers Rd., Oakville Ont. L6K 3S4 (905) 845-3824 Fax: 337-5567 Classified Advertising: 905-632-4440 Circulation: 845-9742 The Oakville Beaver is a member of the Ontario Press Council. The council is located at 80 Gould St., Suite 206, Toronto, Ont., M5B 2M7. Phone (416) 340-1981. Advertising is accepted on the condition that, in the event of a typographical error, that portion of advertising space occupied by the erroneous item, together with a reasonable allowance for signature, will not be charged for, but the balance of the advertisement will be paid for at the applicable rate.The publisher reserves the right to categorize advertisements or decline. Editorial and advertising content of the Oakville Beaver is protected by copyright. Unauthorized use is prohibited. Commentary Guest Columnist NEIL OLIVER Vice President and GroupPublisher DAVID HARVEY General Manager JILL DAVIS Editor in Chief ROD JERRED Managing Editor DANIEL BAIRD Advertising Director RIZIERO VERTOLLI Photography Director SANDY PARE Business Manager Metroland Media Group Ltd. includes: Ajax/Pickering News Advertiser, Alliston Herald/Courier, Arthur Enterprise News, Barrie Advance, Caledon Enterprise, Brampton Guardian, Burlington Post, Burlington Shopping News, City Parent, Collingwood/Wasaga Connection, East York Mirror, Erin Advocate/Country Routes, Etobicoke Guardian, Flamborough Review, Georgetown Independent/Acton Free Press, Harriston Review, Huronia Business Times, Lindsay This Week, Markham Economist & Sun, Midland/Penetanguishine Mirror, Milton MARK DILLS Director of Production MANUEL GARCIA Production Manager CHARLENE HALL Director of Distribution ALEXANDRIA ANCHOR Circ. Manager WEBSITE oakvillebeaver.com The Oakville Beaver is a division of Delays delivering Oakville hospital Ted Chudleigh, Halton MPP e have a sign. It's a nice sign. It's just north of Dundas Street at Third Line where the new Oakville Ted Chudleigh hospital will be built. Apparently that sign is all we will have, for perhaps as long as five years, as hospital construction in Oakville has been delayed by the provincial government. Ministry officials have confirmed to me that Oakville's new hospital will be delayed at least a year past the anticipated 2012 opening. With Oakville delayed, I fear expansion expected in Milton, will be delayed even longer. Ministry officials are saying the problem is a lack of skilled labour available to take on the project, which they refer to as 'construction capacity'. This, as the lengthy building boom in Halton is beginning to slow down. Local construction people tell me that skilled labourers are going to Alberta. We need medical facilities. When it comes to population growth, providing those facilities is the one responsibility of the provincial government. It was the current provincial government which forced the high pace of growth in Halton through its Places To Grow initiative. They even added the Health Tax to help pay for their promises. Much of that money comes out of the pockets of Halton residents who have good jobs and a higher-thanaverage rate of employment. Yet Halton residents are left waiting, waiting for health care improvements they have paid dearly to get. With populations rising dramatically, it comes as no surprise that our current hospital facilities in Oakville and Milton are due for significant expansion. Milton hospital was built for a population of about 30,000 but Milton is now home to almost 70,000 people. No more facilities can be added to the current site of Oakville hospital but the population keeps growing and is now over 170,000 people. I have been fighting for new facilities since before 2003 when I helped secure a land grant for a new hospital in Oakville. Now, with 70,000 more people in Oakville and Milton than those hospital facilities were built to accommodate, we are long past the time for action. I have been pushing hard for years. Now is the time for a new approach. Make no mistake, once you get into our existing facilities the care you receive is excellent and will continue to be. The problem will be getting in. We simply do not have the capacity in these facilities that is necessary to handle our current population. Imagine what it will be like in Halton in 2013 before the new Oakville hospital opens its doors and when Milton's expansion hasn't even begun. By then it is expected that at least another 70,000 people will call Halton home and hospital facilities built for 160,000 people will be handling a population of more than 300,000. Halton patients will be scattered among hospitals in other regions. It's time for the community to get angry. It's time to bombard Premier McGuinty and the new Health Minister David Caplan with our demands that hospital construction be sped up not slowed down. I have a petition in my office available to be signed. I have a template letter posted on my website at www.tedchudleigh.com, which people can copy, sign and mail to the premier. I encourage everyone in Halton riding to get involved. It is only the first step. A petition and letter writing campaign is one form of pressure and it worked in The Lord's Prayer debate. Maybe it will work again. IAN OLIVER President Media Group Ltd. Canadian Champion, Milton Shopping News, Mississauga Business Times, Mississauga News, Napanee Guide, Newmarket/Aurora EraBanner, Northumberland News, North York Mirror, Oakville Beaver, Oakville Shopping News, Oldtimers Hockey News, Orillia Today, Oshawa/Whitby/Clarington Port Perry This Week, Owen Sound Tribune, Palmerston Observer, Peterborough This Week, Picton County Guide, Richmond Hill/Thornhill/Vaughan Liberal, Scarborough Mirror, Stouffville/Uxbridge Tribune, Forever Young, City of York Guardian RECOGNIZED FOR EXCELLENCE BY: Ontario Community Newspapers Association Canadian Community Newspapers Association Suburban Newspapers of America W THE OAKVILLE BEAVER IS PROUD OFFICIAL MEDIA SPONSOR FOR: United Way of Oakville TV AUCTION Upside to the depressing darkness of underground living s I write this, our eldest son and a few of his friends are making a bid to secure an apartment in Toronto. A basement apartment. That's right: our eldest is trying to actually pay someone to let him live underground. For some creatures -- ants, chipmunks, badgers, moles, earthworms, assorted rodents and Gollum immediately come to mind -- living underground is desirable (instinctive burrowing protects them from predators). Conversely, human beings -most of whom are typically not in danger of being attacked by anteaters and eagles -- tend to desire (if not need) the odd glimpse of natural light and the occasional uplifting beam of sunlight. For most, living underground can be dark and depressing. So, why do it? Well, for most it's a simple matter of economics. The less likely it is that you are ever going to get a glimpse of natural light, the less pricey the apartment. Hence, basement apartments are wildly popular amongst struggling students and young people who are, as they say, "just starting out." When I was 18, and "just starting out" as a gymnast, or a journalist -- it was so long ago, I can't recall details -- I found myself far from home, wandering the streets of a strange city looking for lodgings on a salary skimpier than a Brazilian bikini and more A restrictive than a straightjacket. After economics eliminated all apartments in which I would have liked to live, I took what I could get: the basement-level of an old house perched atop a huge hill. Ah, my first digs. I'd like to say that I was so thrilled to be ensconced in my cool bachelor pad that I was blind to the pad's assorted imperfections, but those imperAndy Juniper fections were so pronounced that even an ordinarily oblivious young male could not help but notice. Honestly, how could you not notice that the floors were not level, that when you entered the apartment there was a downward drift that swept you straight through the kitchen and into the bedroom (and if you'd had a few drinks to numb the reality that you were 1,000 miles from home, dreadfully homesick and living underground, well, the downward drift could be downright dangerous)? Oh, to boot, that downward drifting floor had a three-foot fissure that revealed the very earth below it. Then there were the assorted pipes (water, sewage, heat) that jutted down from the ceiling and ran the length of the apartment at the perfect level for cracking open heads if you weren't vigilant (or, again, if you'd had a few drinks). I artfully lined those pipes with empty rum bottles. I spent the majority of my time in that basement half in-the-bag, and three-quarters concussed. You probably think I'm exaggerating, as is my habit, but I'm not. This apartment was so bad that when my brother flew up for a visit, he took one look around my underground digs and declared: "I'm not sleeping here. Seriously. No way." And didn't. Still, good things often arise out of bad situations. At the time I was living like a mole, I had a girlfriend back home. I was hopelessly in love with her and I hoped she loved me. When she wrote to say that she was coming for a visit, I knew that the apartment would be a test of her true feelings. When she arrived, stayed a week and complained only once, and only about one aspect of the apartment -- that the washroom was located outside the main living quarters, and that it was unheated (and this, friends, was Thunder Bay in winter) well, I knew that she was as gaga over me as I was over her. And that was the upside of my underground experience. Andy Juniper can be visited at his Web site, www.strangledeggs.com, or contacted at ajuniper@strangledeggs.com.