The Nanaimo Regional Hospital District board passed its budget, with a 21 per cent tax increase, or $63.96 per $100,000 of assessed property value.

In a Tuesday, March 24 press release, the board cited the Province of B.C. moving forward with the board’s offer to pay for a concept plan for a patient tower and cardiac catheterization lab at the hospital, as part of the reason for the increase.

It brings the overall tax requisition for the hospital district to $49.5 million. This includes $3.5 million for capital equipment and minor projects, $5.3 million for debt servicing on existing major capital projects, as well as reserve funds for the board’s priority projects, including the patient tower and the cardiac cath lab.

During the meeting, Janice Perrino, hospital board chair and Nanaimo area director, told the board it’s expected that the concept plans will take approximately six months.

“Minister (Bowinn) Ma, our minister of infrastructure, gave us the word that we will go forward with the concept plan, good news,” Perrino said. “The concept plan must include the cath lab and must include operational dollars for the cath lab, better news. It was just fantastic.”

After the concept plan, a business plan would need to be undertaken, which the board has also offered to fund. Once that begins, Perrino estimated it to take another six to 18 months before it can move to request for proposals, then construction stage.

Typically, with capital projects such as a cardiac cath lab or patient tower, the province would be responsible for covering 60 per cent of the cost, while regional hospital district taxpayers would cover the remainder.

Under this new agreement, the early stages of planning will fall under the 40 per cent covered by the hospital district, while the later stages will fall within the province’s 60 per cent.

Not all board members were onboard with a 21 per cent tax increase from last year’s tax amount.

Leanne Salter, Coombs area director, said that while residents need hospital access, she brought up an anecdote of one resident telling her they are moving away because they can’t afford to live in the area. Meanwhile, both hospital capital projects are years away from seeing any construction.

“We really need to get a handle on what we’re doing here, because our job is sewer, water, garbage, rural roads, land. That’s what we’re supposed to be focusing on, and we’re not,” Salter said. “We’re far beyond that, we’re looking at zero waste, sea level rise, air quality, and now this insane amount for the hospital.”

Mark Swain, Lantzville area director, drew attention to the different amounts each community in the regional district will need to pay, calling it a “gross disparity” with the higher accessed house values in Lantzville.

“I understand, yes the average house cost, that’s fine, but I try to split it out to what is the per capita cost and if I’m using Nanaimo’s estimated population for 2025 being 122,000, basically the per capita cost is $186 per person,” Swain said. “Lantzville, using a population estimate of 4,676 people is $271. There’s disparity.”

The other two votes against came from directors Jessica Stanley and Lehann Wallace.

Despite this, overall the budget earned the favour of the majority, including Sean Wood, Parksville area director, who said they are “making up for what previous boards did not do” in filling reserve funds.

“I think we’re just going to continue doing what we know is a good decision, so that later boards will hopefully have to put away less,” Wood said. “I hear frustration from the board about shovels in the ground, and we all want that. I think our chair is doing a fantastic job about making sure we get shovels in the ground.”

Doug O’Brien, Parksville area director, meanwhile, argued there is “nothing more important than hospital care” on the regional district’s budget.

“As painful as it may be … we need the health care,” he said.