Editor:
Find attached a photograph of a large parking lot which has been built north of Peace Arch District Hospital on the corner of 156 Street and 17 Avenue.
Notice that the parking lot is empty.
It is always empty.
When people are on waiting lists up to a year and beyond for surgery, why has Fraser Health spent a large amount of money to build this parking lot?
(Editor's note: Jackie Smith, executive director of Peace Arch Hospital and Community Health Foundation, contacted PAN late Monday to note the parking lot in question actually belongs to the foundation– an independent, board-governed organization that works in partnership with Fraser Health.)
My estimate of the cost of the parking lot is somewhere around $2 million. Two million dollars!
There were, if I remember correctly, three houses located along 156 Street and a small school building along 17 Avenue. Four regular sized lots. I speculate that each of these lots were sold for, at least, $450,000, or a total of $1.8 million. I speculate that the cost of developing the parking lot was around $200,000.
A total of $2 million for a parking lot that is empty.
Wouldn’t it have been wiser to spend this kind of money to assist people who need medical attention rather than on a parking lot?
Roger Currie, Surrey