Mayor Mike sends invoice to Premier for ER closures

B.C. Premier David Eby is about to get a huge surprise when he gets his mail this week; a $103,831.87  invoice from the City of Merritt.

Merritt Mayor Mike Goetz forwarded details to the media this week of a letter penned on July 10, and the invoice he is sending to the province for the closures of the emergency room of the Nicola Valley Hospital.

The letter reads:

“Since October 2022, when this Council was sworn in, we have had 24-emergency room closures: 19 days in 2023 and 5 days in 2024.

We recognize the complexity of operating a health care system and dealing with staffing challenges. While it is distressing to lose those vital healthcare days, we as a community have paid in full for these service days which we did not receive. Compounding this issue, during Emergency Room closures, the city-run Merritt Fire Rescue Department has to step up to provide paramedic or ambulance services.

To pay for the City’s paramedic service caused by the emergency room closures, the City of Merritt has had to raise its taxes one percent.

In effect, the residents of Merritt are paying twice, while only receiving rudimentary healthcare paid by the municipality and not receiving the level of healthcare promised by the Province.

It seems only natural that if you pay for a service you do not receive, that you should be reimbursed for that lack of service. While we cannot address the healthcare services paid by the taxpayers, the City of Merritt pays $635 via the Thompson Nicola Health District every year. We seek to be reimbursed for that payment.”

In a recent interview with Q101 news Mayor Goetz expanded on the issue saying the residents of Merritt deserve better from the health care system then what we have been receiving in past years.

“We (Merritt) need our hospital. We need our emergency room to be open.,” Goetz noted. “We had nineteen closures in 2023,  and we deserve better. We have many events and activities happening in Merritt, especially during the summer months, like softball and Bass Coast so if something serious happens and we don’t have our emergency department open, the results can be tragic.”

The letter goes on to read:

“In addition, we expect to be reimbursed for the Province’s use of the Merritt Fire Rescue Department, which is required to address local paramedic calls when the local Emergency Room closes and ambulance crews leave the community to transport citizens to Kamloops or Kelowna hospitals. The cost of this service is attached.

While the Thompson Nicola Health District supports this resolution in principle, this is an issue for the Provincial government. The City of Merritt has paid in advance for these crucial healthcare service days that we did not receive. We seek reimbursement or credit for these interruptions to our healthcare service.

As we head into a Provincial election, healthcare users will speak loudly of these lost service days, which they paid for and did not receive service for. There will be a lot of talk of commitment, integrity and fairness, or lack thereof.”

The invoice includes:

• $55, 125.00 in medical responses for 2023
• $   1,132.00 in consumables such as naloxone, oxygen, and other related expenses.
• $33,992.41  for 2023 Emergency Room Closures (19)
• $ 9,069.93 for 2024 Emergency Room Closures (to date 5**)

(** notes that at the time this letter was written there have been three more closures)

Mayor Goetz concluded his letter by saying:

“Mayor and Council of the City of Merritt urge the Provincial government to compensate our municipality for lost service days since the start of 2023, including the expenses incurred by the City due to the absence of these services. It is the right thing to do.”

There’s no word of any response from the Premier’s office at this time.

Q101’s Roger White will sit down live with Mayor Mike Goetz on Monday morning at 11 a.m. to discuss this issue and more.