Darn! that I didn’t get this to you earlier. Sorry it’s not edited down. Although Saskatoon-based, the issues are national.
TAKE ADVANTAGE OF REQUEST FOR PUBLIC INPUT
BACKGROUND:
– CEO’s of the largest Health Districts in Saskatchewan are paid in excess of $250,000 plus perks. (About 5 years ago the Regina Health District paid $256,000.) Deputy Ministers in the Provincial Govt are paid less than half this amount, an indication that the Health District salaries are …. (you fill in the blank).
– A change to the Health Boards got rid of all the elected positions. The Boards are made up entirely of Government appointees.
– The CEO of the Saskatoon Health District announced on a Friday that he was leaving to pursue independent work.
– On the Monday it was announced that he was under contract to the Saskatoon Health District to help the new, Acting-CEO (his replacement).
We paid him $160,000 for the contract; and simultaneously pay the new CEO.
There was a subsequent newspaper report that his wife got a job at the Saskatoon NDP Caucus office (the NDP is in power), at a salary of $95,000.
– A year ago Maura Davies was hired, the new CEO of the Saskatoon Health District. (She replaced the Acting-CEO.) I don’t know her salary.
– On July 14th, 2006 I sent an email to Maura (it was circulated in our network – see below) “Re: re-structuring and re-staffing plans for the Saskatoon Health Region, … There is no mention of participation from the citizens who are served by the Health Region.”
– PLEASE READ MAURA’S INPUT. She writes: “I hope that you (INSERT: the public) will take the time to share your views …”
– Last month 3 vice-presidents were gotten rid of.
– This week I inquired: “Dear Maura,
In what salary range are the new vice-presidents being recruited?”. She’s on holidays and I haven’t received a call-back from the VP of Human Resources (Brian Morgan 655-3309) who would know the answer. So I can’t tell the salary range to you right now.
– I encourage everyone who is concerned about the Medicare System, for whatever reason, to provide input to Maura.
(Link no longer valid http://www.saskatoonhealthregion.ca/about_us/strategic_home.htm)
Many people from around the Province come to Saskatoon for treatment. This is for you, too. Taxes will continue upward for everyone.
– excerpt from newspaper: “Davies is eager to forge relationships with other facilities on the university campus, such as the Canadian Light Source (Synchrotron) and Vaccine and Infectious Disease Organization.” (VIDO)
(Old-timers in our network may remember mention of the movie “The Constant Gardener”. It is based on a novel by le Carre about the scrupulous quest by the drug companies to develop the next treatment for tuberculosis (not fiction). TB strains resistant to the existing drugs are proliferating and TB is on the rise, especially in native communities. I know it all too well, because I contracted TB last year (as old-timers in our network know).
I get a little testy when I read about vaccines and infections. We in Canada continue to undermine the health of people around the world through our excessive consumerism. Corporations move their operations to other countries where labour is cheap and environmental regulation is worse than it is here. The pollutants weaken immune systems, opening people up to disease. And then we (the Saskatoon Health District?) put our money into the development of vaccines (which the drug companies “partner” with us to develop?). We know that those vaccines will never be affordable to children in countries made “poor” by our buying behaviours, by our economic system.
And can we ever develop a vaccine for every disease (weakened immune system) that is associated with the poisons we put into the environment? We can export the pollution by putting the manufacturing plants in other countries, or so we think. But take just one poison that comes out of some industrial activity: mercury. It remains air-borne for over a year before coming down in rainwater and into the food chain – long enough to come from China to Canada.
Exactly who is the “Vaccine and Infectious Disease Organization” and what are the terms of the relationship with them to be?
Anyway – you get the gist: the dollars need to go into active “remove the causes” of disease. Take a stand on transfatty acids. Take a stand on the removal of pesticides. Take a stand: get the coca-cola and junk foods out of the hospitals. Take a stand: be creative.
We spend more and more money on Medicare. Things continue to get worse instead of better, which is an indication to me that the money isn’t being spent where it is needed. It is a sign that CHANGE is required.
– I haven’t taken a sufficiently thorough look at the Saskatoon Health District “Vision” to be able to say “there is nothing about prevention, or “remove the cause” versus the “pop a pill” approach. If it’s an issue, it’s up to us to make it known.
I hope to get a couple of submissions written up, one to do with ” But I keep thinking of CEO’s of little old health districts in Sask getting $256,000 plus perks. And the City Manager for Regina getting, in the early 1990’s, $160,000 plus perks when the City Manager for the Hfx-Dartmouth Metropolitan Area was receiving less than that, for a much more challenging and larger responsibilty (amalgamation of and integration of services for 4 different municipal governments).
This society is supposed to be built on the premise of equality. I don’t think you can have equality when you start paying salaries at a level that creates an elite. And I don’t doubt for a minute but that we can get extremely good people for less than the inflated figures. We’re brain-washed into thinking we can’t.”.
I think of “Hayes and Associates”, a company that comes in and studies remuneration packages for “the management team” and then makes recommendations that go to the Board for approval. They came to the company I worked at, in the 1970’s. Inevitably the executives receive more money after Hayes has been in. I went through the Calgary airport in 1999. The front page article announced that the CEO of the Calgary Health District is paid $750,000 plus perks (7 years ago).
The way that the salaries for CEO’s in Saskatchewan become inflated, to the point where we are creating elites, is that a “management consulting company” like Hayes will be hired to come in and make recommendations. They will use the Calgary CEO’s salary in the formula, among other factors. If we don’t like what the Board (all appointed by the Govt) is doing with the Health District, which is ours and our responsibility) then it is up to us to tell them so. The way we are going is not sustainable. Medicare is eating up budgets that should be used for education.
I have to laugh. People in Saskatchewan think we have this egalitarian society. Meanwhile WE OURSELVES actively participate in the creation of a moneyed elite in our institutions, in healthcare no less, through our failure to ask questions. Someplace along the line we lost our backbone.
Deputy Ministers of entire departments of the Provincial Government earn less than HALF of what the CEO’s of some Health Districts are paid. But now, of course, if the CEO’s of the Health Districts are being paid that much, the salaries of Deputy Ministers will have to increase. Or so the reasoning goes.
As we found out earlier, when trying to get the Regina Health District to speak up about the need to stop the use of pesticides (for non-essential purposes), the Health Districts (whose Boards are appointed by the Government) will do the minimum possible, and offer “It is the responsibility of the Provincial Government.”. The Provincial Government said, on one hand “It is the responsibility of the Federal Government” and “It is the responsibility of the Health District”.
My interpretation is that large salaries further entrench the status quo.
We can’t get change where we need it because big houses, travel, life-style, and mortgages go along with large salaries. The recipients are too dependent on their pay-cheques to speak out and take a stand on anything.
We all have dependencies.
So I can understand to some extent.
However, the system (institution) as presently constructed, is creating more and more healthcare problems because it seeks technological, instead of human and remove-the-cause-of-the-disease kind of answers.
The open invitation to us, to provide our input to the Health District, to tell the stories of what has happened under the current regime, is a huge opportunity to exert pressure for change.
Cheers!
===========================
thanks, Maura.
Appreciated.
/Sandra
—–Original Message—–
From: Davies, Maura SktnHR
[mailto:Maura.Davies AT saskatoonhealthregion.ca]
Sent: July 14, 2006 5:40 PM
To: Sandra Finley
Subject: RE: The public
Thank you for your message. The restructuring that I have done to date only deals with the structure of my senior team. This is clearly the prerogative of a CEO although I chose to do it in consultation with members of my staff and medical staff, as well as selected other individuals.
I strongly agree that we need to consult with the public regarding changes to our programs and services. The Saskatoon Health Region is in the midst of developing its first strategic plan. As part of this process, we held focus groups with members of the public across the health region. We
consulted with patients, CEOs and Authority chairs from the northern regions, and many others. We also used the Intranet to solicit input from the
public. You may wish to check out our Intranet site (Link no longer valid http://www.saskatoonhealthregion.ca/about_us/strategic_home.htm) which has a great deal of information on our planning process.
By the end of next week we will be posting our draft plan, with invitations to the public to provide us with feedback. I hope that you will take the time to share your views on the draft plan with us.
Maura Davies
President and Chief Executive Officer
Saskatoon Health Region
3rd Floor, Saskatoon Square
410 – 22nd Street East
Saskatoon, SK S7K
5T6
Ph: (306) 655-3320 / Fax: (306) 655-3394
email: maura.davies AT saskatoonhealthregion.ca
—–Original Message—–
From: Sandra Finley [mailto:sabest1 AT sasktel.net]
Sent: July 14, 2006 3:26 PM
To: Davies, Maura SktnHR
Subject: The public
Dear Maura,
Re re-structuring and re-staffing plans for the Saskatoon Health Region, excerpts from the Saskatoon Star Phoenix, July 1st, follow.
There is no mention of participation from the citizens who are served by the Health Region.
From my experience of public input in Saskatchewan, I would say that you, and consequently we citizens, will be well served by presentations from the public into the process.
As I understand, every member of the Health Region Board is appointed by the Government. There are no members who come to the Board through true democratic process. The necessity for public input is thus greater than might otherwise be the case.
The Saskatoon Health Region serves northern Saskatchewan.
The usual public process:
– written submissions
– public meetings for the purpose of collecting input
– the writing of a draft proposal
– draft proposal goes back to the community for response
– public input is considered and the proposal is then ready for finalization.
I would propose that the public consultations take place in:
– Saskatoon (urban)
– Watrous (rural and to the far east of the Region)
– Macklin (west of province, representative of a community that sends patients to Saskatoon) (I just pull these out of a hat).
Through email networks notice of public process and meetings can be quickly disseminated.
I look forward to your response.
Best wishes,
Sandra Finley
(contact info)
================================
EXCERPTS FROM NEWSPAPER:
Under Davies’ leadership, vice-presidents will “work closely with physician leaders, directors, managers and other staff to fine-tune the structures within their portfolios.”
Full details of the new structure are available to staff on the internal intranet website. The priorities noted by Davies include an enhanced quality of care, patient safety, access to treatment and reduced waiting times, as well as a greater clarity of roles and accountability of staff.
She has also created a new position for a vice-president of research and innovation (to be recruited jointly with the University of Saskatchewan) to improve the region’s educational component and dormant opportunities “the current structure doesn’t support.” Davies is eager to forge relationships with other facilities on the university campus, such as the Canadian Light Source and Vaccine and Infectious Disease Organization.