Local Share Financing Plan Achieved for Hospital Redevelopment

Muskoka Algonquin Healthcare is pleased to
announce that together with our hospital foundations and municipal partners in Muskoka and the
Almaguin Highlands, a plan to finance the community’s share of the future redevelopment of our
local hospitals has been reached following several months of collaborative and positive
discussion.
The financing plan demonstrates the community’s collective intent to contribute the required $225
million local share cost of a near billion-dollar redevelopment project to build new hospitals in
Bracebridge and Huntsville, with construction scheduled to begin as early as 2029. The local
share plan is one of the significant components Muskoka Algonquin Healthcare must complete
for the Ministry of Health’s Stage 1.3 capital redevelopment submission, aimed for early 2024.
Achieving the multi-million dollar financing plan is the shared accomplishment of the Local Share
Committee comprised of representatives of the Muskoka Algonquin Healthcare Board of
Directors, Huntsville Hospital Foundation and South Muskoka Hospital Foundation Board of
Directors, the Mayors of every municipality in Muskoka, the Chair of the District Municipality of
Muskoka, and the Chair of the Almaguin Highlands Health Council (representing 10 municipal
councils in the Almaguin Highlands).
Moreen Miller, Chair of the Local Share Committee and Muskoka Algonquin Healthcare Board of
Directors, says the financial commitments made by all parties demonstrate the shared
responsibility to the common goal to build a regionally unique, multi-site healthcare infrastructure
and a strong local partnership to invest in and build a Made-in-Muskoka Healthcare system.
“Muskoka Algonquin Healthcare is delighted to reach this milestone in our work to design a madein-Muskoka healthcare system that will serve our 4,000 square kilometre catchment in Muskoka
and surrounding areas with safe, reliable access to high-quality healthcare for future generations,”
says Miller. “Together, we have demonstrated that the regions of Muskoka and East Parry Sound
are united in one objective to invest in and build a system infrastructure that matches our unique
region, the changing population, and the communities around us from Severn Bridge to Almaguin,
anchored by two new, state-of-the-art acute care hospitals.”
The financing plan includes the following financial commitments to achieve greater than 95% of
the $225 million local share:
• $77.3 from the District of Muskoka
• $38.2 from Muskoka Algonquin Healthcare
• $35 million from the Huntsville Hospital Foundation
• $35 million from the South Muskoka Hospital Foundation
• $10 million from the Town of Bracebridge
• $10 million from the Town of Huntsville
• $9.5 million from the municipalities of Almaguin Highlands (East Parry Sound)
• $1 million from the Town of Gravenhurst
The Local Share Committee has further committed to address the means for raising the remaining
gap, including interest related to timing difference, within three years.
“With the Ministry of Health funding the majority of the build, we are fortunate to be leveraging an
entire province’s tax base to build a regionally unique, multi-site healthcare infrastructure,” says
Miller. “For every dollar we invest locally, we get at least three dollars from the province for our
new hospitals.”
Miller praised the hard work by the partners and their individual agencies to come together with a
solution to the required local share financing plan.
“Every contribution to this project is respected and appreciated,” says Miller. “The value of our
collective investment is profound. There are undeniable economic benefits to attracting new
healthcare professionals to our communities – not just to Bracebridge or Huntsville – but to
Sundridge and to Gravenhurst and areas in between. When we set out to reach the local share
goal, it was only a matter of how we would get there, not if. We are thrilled with this incredible
progress and momentum that shows the Ministry that Muskoka Algonquin Healthcare is
positioned for its new hospitals.”