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Town moving forward with long-term care proposal on half of Humber Lands

October 7, 2021   ·   0 Comments

By Sam Odrowski

More long-term care beds and seniors housing is coming to Orangeville.

Council passed a motion 7-0 directing Town staff to move forward with a 192-bed long-term care (LTC) proposal by Primacare on half of the Town’s 30-acre Humber lands, during its Sept. 27 meeting.

The lands were originally designated for an Orangeville Campus of Humber College, but the project was cancelled.   

For the remaining half of the Humber lands, Council will investigate what would fit best and how to get the most value per acre. Currently, the Humber Lands account for 30 per cent of all vacant greenfield land available to build on in Orangeville, making it an important project.

Mayor Sandy Brown, who’s voiced his support for Primacare’s LTC project during their presentations in the past, reiterated his stance before a motion was made to enter negotiations with Primacare to determine fair market value of half of the Humber Lands.

“My belief is that we should be moving this process forward, I know that there’s some concern about land use, about employment land specifically, I believe that a negotiation should be started with Primacare, perhaps on half of the land,” he remarked.

He stressed the fact that Southern Dufferin County and Northern Caledon is not serviced by any state-of-the-art LTC facilities and that Primacare fixes this.

“I was flabbergasted by the [Primacare] presentation. I mean, this is state-of-the-art care,” he said. “The butterfly model, I believe it’s come from England, all the progressive institutions, long term care institutions are adopting this.

“I had a conversation yesterday with our Solicitor General Sylvia Jones who marveled at it. She’s seen it in play in Peel Region. She invited me to come and tour one of the facilities,” he added.

The butterfly model utilized an emotion-based approach to care.

Mayor Brown also noted that the project would bring 200 to 250 healthcare jobs to the region.

Coun. Joe Andrews said in his experience, he’s had a significant amount of people reach out to him regarding the absence of seniors housing in Orangeville.

“The pandemic has certainly addressed this, and it has heightened the importance of caring for our senior population, and those that are heading demographically into that area,” he noted.

However, Coun. Andrews expressed concerns about the timelines for when Primacare can begin their project. They’ve been guaranteed half the land, but until the Town of Orangeville finishes its Official Plan review, which could take until 2023, Primacare won’t know If they can acquire the entire Humber Lands property. Without knowing how much land they’ll be able to acquire, it’s difficult to solidify their plans.

“Where I’m struggling, in my point of view, is to try and figure out what is the happy medium here because of the immediacy,” said Coun. Andrews.  “For us to wait another two years, three years… we need to look at this now. We have to come up with a solution.”

Coun. Lisa Post also shared her worries about the project’s delay, with the immediate need for more high-quality long-term care beds as well as Personal Support Workers (PSWs). Primacare is in talks with Georgian College to develop a satellite Health Science Campus where they would train PSWs, once their LTC facility is built.

Coun. Grant Peters said he too is anxious to get a long-term care facility in place, knowing the approval process through the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care can be complicated.

“That, said, I think you all know I am an advocate for having a strong plan in place, especially as it comes to land use,” he remarked. “But to put it off by 18 months or two years, as Coun. Post, mentioned, I don’t think that’s a good move, when we’re looking to get these beds in place sooner than later.”

Coun. Andy Macintosh agreed, noting that the Primacare project should move forward as soon as possible.

Coun. Sherwood said she’s very much in support of building up long term care capacity but is worried that they won’t get as much revenue then if it was zoned and taxed as industrial lands.

Meanwhile, Coun. Todd Taylor expressed concerns about how to proceed with the Humber Lands, as it’s an incredibly valuable piece of land to the Town, being one of the last parcels of vacant land it has left.

“My reluctance is simply with the fact that this is it guys like this is our last big hurrah,” he said.

However, he added that he will vote in alignment with Town Council and “will not get in the way of progress.”

Coun. Taylor’s one caveat was that the land will be sold at what it’s worth as appraised by an arbitrator. 

“It’s super important to me and it will be to the taxpayers of Orangeville that there’s no there’s no freebies here,” he remarked.

Council voted unanimously to proceed with the sale of half the Humber Lands to Primacare.

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