These are the guys who pissed you off

You can probably figure out where I'm going with this.

The decision to award London the new $108-million Shriner children's hospital - which still must be ratified by two-thirds of the Shriners' voting delegates at their July convention - has made my birthplace something of a dirty word here in the ville where I've lived the other half of my life. It's also made for a mixed bag of emotions personally.

The hometown proud part of me is secretly ecstatic about the new prestige the project will bring a city I've had rare occasion to boast about. London usually only makes the news when Labatt's rolls out another brand of water and hops, or when GM Defense, Canada's largest military contractor, rolls out another light-armoured tank, or when one of its religiously insane mayors rolls out another biblical reason for ignoring calls by the Ontario Human Rights Tribunal to allow Gay Pride parades. Those sorts of things.

On the other hand, the Montreal-loving-and-never-leaving me mourns the loss of yet another of those essential elements that makes a modern metropolis great, elevating the city that gave me opportunities I never would have had in London.

It's a tough call.

First, let me say that London isn't the backwater you think it is... Well okay, yeah it is, but not for the reasons it's being made out to be. Since the 1960s, local and provincial government, as well as the University of Western Ontario, have dumped hundreds of millions of dollars into hospital infrastructure and research. UWO and London's primary research hospital, University Hospital, are so intertwined as to be almost one organism, and as such have developed and championed a number of pioneering surgeries and therapies, and were early forerunners in the field of transplants. My brother received a kidney transplant there 12 years ago, and there's no underestimating the peace of mind that comes with knowing you're flying with surgical top guns.

The city has a history of attracting A-list medical specialists, such as Dr. Charles Drake, a world-renowned neurosurgeon who developed and perfected surgeries for brain aneurysms (he famously saved singer/actress Della Reese's life after she suffered a near-fatal aneurysm during a 1979 taping of The Tonight Show). This week the London Health Sciences Centre - an integrated and concentrated network of hospitals and research facilities operating along the same lines as the Montreal superhospital projects, only functional - welcomed internationally acclaimed surgeon, scientist and medical boy wonder Dr. Christopher Schlachta. Dr. Schlachta joins the Canadian Surgical Technologies and Advanced Robotics team there as director. He's also a Montrealer. And as I write this, Prime Minister Paul Martin is in London touring the National Research Centre laboratories at UWO.

This decades-long dedication to research has put London on the map, at least in terms of medicine, and consequently you can't throw a stone in London without hitting a doctor. Go ahead and try it sometime. They don't care, they're doctors.

So now you know the enemy the Shriners have chosen to sleep with. (Did anyone else think it odd that all those goofily smiling oldsters lined up in front of the TV cameras last week, wearing felt hats your average self-respecting Turk wouldn't get caught dead in, are controlling not only billions of dollars - the worldwide Shriner endowment is currently estimated at $5-billion - but also potentially the medical fortunes of a loved one?) But, of course, it couldn't end there.

On April 26, The Gazette quoted unnamed sources ostensibly involved in the hospital negotiations as saying, "It's all about the political uncertainty of Quebec," adding that "Montreal should have won, based on the merits of its bid and the excellent reputation of the Shriners Hospital on Cedar Ave. They said they couldn't understand why London beat Montreal, unless the Shriners were skittish about the prospect of Quebec independence."

"If Montreal secedes, then what have you got?" prominent Texan Shriner Terry McGuire is also quoted as saying. "They're not part of Canada any more, right? And our bylaws say we have to have a presence in Canada."

Interminable rumbling about the threat of separation is just so much background noise for your average Montrealer. It's unsettling but familiar, like the brother who has six toes. But for people who aren't exposed to it unceasingly, it's harder to ignore. It creeps them out.

But the whole separation smokescreen is just a bit too easy, and seems contrived to deflect questions away from more sensitive concerns. Like money - how much, where it's coming from and where it's going. A betting man might say the Shriners aren't so much worried about separation as they are about monetary reparation. In large part because Montreal's future prospects of raising enough cash to fund the Shriners hospital - which also has to compete with fundraising initiatives by McGill, McGill University Health Care and the Centre hospitalier de l'Université de Montréal to the tune of $400-millon - are bleak at best.

The recent Public Health Agency of Canada National Survey of Giving, Volunteering and Participating put Quebec at the back of the line when it comes to the average annual health donation per person, and La Belle Province also came in dead last in the overall percentage of donors per capita (42 per cent compared to Newfoundland's 71 per cent). The (forgive me) Fraser Institute's 2004 Generosity Index also found that Quebec had the lowest percentage of aggregate income donated to charities (0.3 per cent per person), and that we also ranked last with an average yearly donation of $488, less than half of the national average.

Not exactly the kind of charitable backdrop you want for a project that is required to raise over $50-million through philanthropic means. And some believe fundraising isn't so much about the Shriner standard of giving as the Shriner standard of living.

In a piece published last May titled "Shriner showdown" (Hour 1220), Hour reporter Alex Roslin wrote that "a 1986 Orlando Sentinel inquiry found that only 30 per cent of total Shriner fundraising and investment income went to the hospitals. The Shriners' best-known fundraising activity is the Shrine Circus... But only 1 per cent of circus profits went to medical care, the newspaper estimated. It found that the rest of the money went to things like entertainment, travel and upkeep of private bars for the Masonic organization's half-million members."

This is big business, a sentiment echoed in a 2000 speech to the Grand Masters of the Shrine by Imperial Potentate (or grand poohbah) Ralph W. Semb. He characterized the Shriner hospital program as follows: "Now totalling 22, these hospitals continue to get busier, and the costs of operating these state-of-the-art health centres continue to escalate. Not only do we take care of orthopedic problems, burn problems, spinal cord problems, but have added things like cleft palate, port wine stain removal and others."

"Today we are spending over $17 every second of every minute of every hour of every day, or nearly $1.5-million per day in taking care of these children."

Which means no rolling the dice on your cash flow. The Shriners could have argued that the hospital went west over logistics and financing and practicality issues, but the "s" word is a tried-and-true negotiation assassin. When deployed as an excuse for, well, just about anything (Losing your hair? must be separation anxiety), it's hard to get around. What do you say? Aside from the usual empty assurances, there's really not much you can say. In a nutshell, the Shriners played the national "Get out of jail free" card.

In the meantime, the land in London is set aside, and it's clean (the Glen Yards superhospital site in Montreal will likely still be digging up industrial contaminants by the time the London hospital opens in 2009). It's in a deathly dull area of town, to the south toward the 401, just off Wellington Road, the strip mall equivalent of Taschereau Blvd. in Brossard. A place where you might as well be sick.

So grudging congratulations to London. Until next we meet...
 
 

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What's really going on here?     It doesn't come as any surprise that Montreal is losing yet another institution to another province. Those of us who want to thumb our noses at the Shriner's for their decision can go ahead, but do you really blame them? They are merely following suit in a trend that has plagued this city of ours and has become all too common. I think they tried to get out of here using an excuse we've all heard time and time again. Look at any sector of our society and the story is the same, banks are moving their head offices to TO, healthcare professionals are frustrated with being penalized by pay cuts and scrutinized language proficiency tests, and just don't want to deal with the politics here anymore. Almost 3 decades later, and the idea of 2 new superhospitals in our city is just that, an idea! And yet oddly enough, the concept of the Montreal Casino was realized in a blink of an eye! The fact remains that Montreal is slowly losing ground, but more troubling than that, is that if this trend continues, we risk losing more talented professionals who would want nothing more than to stay here in Montreal. For those of us whose future in Montreal is yet uncertain, may I suggest a game of Blackjack?
Yogesh Patel	{10 votes}	May 7th, 2005
Some people have it all!     The Shriners Hospital issue would not be the first example of a departure related to the threat of separatism. This concern often heard, "What if Quebec separates", is the most worn out excuse used for leaving the province. Over the decades, companies like Gillett, Cadbury and GM, amongst many others, flew away at the first opportunity without saying "see you!". The irony is that Quebec is still a Canadian province... So, in the name of a so-called worry, economic possibilities have been lost although Québec was still faithful to the Canadian creed. Maybe someday there will be enough people over here to say: "What more could we lose for Canada's sake?" Somehow this allegiance has to pay off, don't we agree over that fact? Is money the key issue? It's well-known that a piece of land worth 5 M$ (the Glenn yards), future site of the hospital, has been granted for free. Also the government of Québec is willing to offer some more 5 M$ as an enticement for keeping the Shriners around. What makes these efforts look hopeless is, according to The Gazette, that those figures aren't apparently displayed in an intern Shriners report! Concerning this Public Health Agency survey, I would be cautious in concluding Québec is the worst place in terms of donations, even behind the NFL&L! Criteria should be seriously looked at, knowing most of the statistics are gathered from personal income tax reports. Over here, the anonymous donations as well as the public subsidies might be more important than anywhere else in this country; therefore, these parameters should also be taken into account. Finally, I would be tempted to conclude financial deals, somehow, have a life of their own. If, at first look, some projects don't seem to work out, it doesn't mean circumstances won't change for the better. Money calls money, I'd say. Of course, London is clean, quiet, has a superb UWO campus and almost no unemployed people. It is surely reassuring, no doubt!
Alain Gauthier	{37 votes}	May 1st, 2005
Babylon, P.Q.     The Shriners' dicked around with this city long enough that any sentimental bone was pretty much chewed up and spat out by me and mine. I know that the Shriners do a lot of good work (they also take part in some dirty business but we don't talk about that, do we?) but in the end you've got to balance the needs of the city versus what it can afford to lose and honestly, I could easily live with the Shriners' ultimate choice because they made themselves into manipulative pariahs when they needn't have been that way.
Pedro Eggers		October 9th, 2005
Lost Opportunity     Montreal used to be the capital of the country for a while in the middle of the 19th century. If it had reamined so, it would have been blessed with lower unemployment rate and it would have resulted in less pressure for separation from Canada. French Canadians would have received far better treatment much sooner. Montreal would have rivalled even New York City as a city to do business. However it also lost out to Quebec City as the seat of the provincial capital and thus lost a lot of clout with decision makers there who took their sweet time deciding the fate of the two super hospitals and by consequence that of the Shriner's. When so many head offices moved to Toronto and Calgary the image of Montreal became tarnished. The move of the Shriner's to Ontario is just part of that trend. With health professionals not getting licences to practice here after passing language proficiency tests there might be a serious problem with recrutement and retention of medical personnel. The low wages paid here would not attract the best people. The Shriners just did not want to take the gamble. Who can blame them!
Stephen Talko	{4 votes}	May 5th, 2005
Boo hoo, but oh well...     I'm of two minds about this. On the one hand, it's a shame we're missing out on getting a new hospital. On the other hand, it's still going to be built somewhere, and moreover, I think I may be a little tired of the Shriners' games. If Quebecers do give the lowest percentage of their incomes to charity in the country, maybe it's best that the Shriner's take themselves out of the picture so those dollars can go to organizations who spend more than 1% of it doing good.
Karen Sollazzo	{10 votes}	May 2nd, 2005
Shriners     Psht? Maybe the shriners will be better off. Poeple have nerve putting London down or saying it's a small sacrifice to pay for independence. Give me a fucking break. As someone who has been to hospitals in both Quebec and Ontario, I'm sorry but the hospitals in Quebec are a fucking farce. Using the political instability in Quebec is the safe political answer because it's true, the real estate industry used it for years. Fact is Quebec's healthcare system is a disgrace. Denial runs deep.
Josee Lacroix	{7 votes}	May 2nd, 2005
Shriners Come On     This is outrageous! I needed the services of the Shriners Hospital when I was young, and I support fully their committment to youngters in Montreal and surrounding areas. However, I cannot believe that they are deciding to move to LONDON, ONTARIO, without the full story that the land which the hospital is going to be built on was donated and more donation will be made once the hospital is establish. This is trivial to Montreal's image, yet, at the same time, I cannot blame the Shriners for leaving, because city officials are not willing to disclose these crucial information to the Shriners. Why should they stay? What does Montreal have that London, Ontario don't have? We are repeating the same mistake like the diving competition, except this time we might actually lose the Shriners Hospital. This isn't just about the constant threat of seperation made by politicians, this is about making Montreal a world class city. My god, when are politicians going to wake up and realise that this threat is only going to further deteriorate the Quebec economy, and outside investment will diminish... Come on Shriners give us one more chance to rectify the problem!
Clara Kwan	{16 votes}	April 30th, 2005
You are giving up a World Class City!     If the Price of Independence would only be the cost of a Hospital that would be so easy. I really can't believe that someone would think we were rich enough to maintain our standard of living after we would become an independent country. What I am sick and tired of is the constant threat of a referendum all the time. There are enough sensible people who live here that know we must learn to live together we are not an Island onto ourselves we belong to a world community and a language is not enough of an excuse to want to rip apart a country throw a continent into turmoil and then realize oh we had it so good. The beauty of this land is we are diverse and different but in the end we are one nation representing a world community. Lets exploit our similarities RESPECT our differences and build on what we have. Xenophobia and pureness does not make us better only vulnerable to the evils of man. Wow !! I really wanted to give the shriners my anger and disgust at there lack of loyalty to a city and a province of all languages and cultures that supported them, worked with them all these many years. To now leave us hanging and run away is a slap in our faces! We have the greatest medical teaching hospitals in the country in both official languages I hope you will still be able to serve the French Italian Greek Russian polish Philippine Pakistani and the multitude of other ethnic communities of our country, when you build your new home in a unilingual city! Shame shame shame shame on you shriners!
Michael Levine	{36 votes}	April 29th, 2005
Money Talks     No organization, charitable or not, would admit to this. GM wants to close a plant in Quebec so they can open it up it Mexico. That's just a bargaining chip for tax dollars. Well the same goes for Shriners. Montreal has been good to the Shriners, but as the article states there is a lot of competition out there for the very little donation dollars available. So they run off to London, a smaller, less metropolitan town, but a place where the Shriners can be the big fish in the pond. As one of the major "charitable" organizations in town they can obtain a lot of money from the populace. It doesn't matter that the hospital is serving a smaller population that might not require its services. So the hospital made the decision to move based on financial incentives rather than serving the greater population. Should that be a surprise? They need a lot of money to pay for the upkeep of their group, so obviously when it comes to helping people or earning more money the Shriners took the money route. Well it's not a great lost for Montreal, we still got the Super Hospital being built and that's being done by government coffers so it can't move. But just once I'd like an organization to admit to the truth of their motives. If a company wants to close a plant and move it to Mexico then say, "I'm threatening your country for tax dollars. Give me money." Or in the Shriners' case, "Sorry, there's more money to be had in London." At least Quebec has the balls to admit it. We threaten separation to get a better deal from the Federal government, and every so often it works. So bye-bye Shriners, we accept your decision. But don't give us that bull about leaving because of separation. You left because you guys want the money.
Alexander Yu	{18 votes}	April 29th, 2005
What A Shame     I cannot believe we lost the bid and lost it to the fact about "Quebec uncertainty" and the fact that in the final bid there was missing information, like the donation of the land. It's a real shame, that they would be moving. I've been to Shriners Hospital only because I had to stay with my daughter for six weeks while she was recuperating and getting therapy after her operation. The therapists and all the staff were totalling amazing. Not only were they nice but the therapy she received was totally amazing. They absolutely care about the children. My daughter still needs their services and it would be sad if they would go away. I've been to other hospitals for therapy and care for my daughter but I have to say Shriners tops them all by a long shot.
Rita Reale	{7 votes}	April 29th, 2005
A move for the Best?     If you ask Montrealers if they care that the hospital may move to London, Ontario, you might get a mixed bag of responses. Those who will truly care will be those who have children of course because now where can they go to get specialty treatment when there youngsters need it. On the other hand the move to London seems to me to be a valid choice for the Shriners to make, I mean the current Liberal government has stirred the murky waters of seperation again bring new found support with the Sponsorship scandle. I would be scared too to open a hospital in a place where the political climate may mean that it will facing turmoil in the near future and create the need for the Shriners to open another hospital Canada again. But if you think of it for those that are sick London is the likely to be the best choice because it is quiet, easy going and peaceful to help those who need to recover do so. I miss the South Western Ontario aspects of towns, cities and communities that are surrounded by the country side giving them that distinct rural feel but allowing the city luxuries like big name stores and so on.
Joshua Martin	{4 votes}	April 29th, 2005
Small price to pay     I will be as quik as possible: if losing the Shriners hospital is the price to pay for independance than i am willing to pay the bill! We heard this "oh we are not sure about investing since Quebec's future is uncertain" so many times before that it is getting old! We, as a very rich province and population, have the power and all the ressources we need to survive the Shriners choice! The story is getting old and i am tired to hear all those stupid things about independance, lets move on and realise it! It is for our own good.
Isabelle Gélinas	{13 votes}	April 28th, 2005
Goodbye, Shriners     Apparently the final report that made the recommendation that the Shriners Hospital should be moved to London, failed to include the fact that Montreal's bid included the donation of land (for the hospital to be built on) and $50 million. So, the sovereignty excuse itself doesn't wash because the Shriners seems to be intent in moving out of Montreal. I am aware of their reputation of having one of the world's finest hospitals and they do good work. I have never required their services as a child but had something happened to me I would have been comforted by the fact that the Shriners was in Montreal. The only other thing that I find alarming in this article is that the Shriners seems to spend most of the money that they raise for entertainment, travel, and upkeep of its private bars for its members. That sounds like there are a lot of drunk Masons out there.
Basil James	{9 votes}	April 28th, 2005
Another load of bull...     As a Montrealer, born and raised, it was a sad day when the Shriner's announced they were moving. It's not like I have anything against any other city, it's just that it's sad that such a prominent land as Montreal loses a big landmark. And personally, I am very offended that they based their decision (or so it seems from their discussion) on the "political uncertainty" of Quebec. As a "no" partisan, I am deeply insulted. Oh well, if they're going to be that stupid and insulting to us, maybe we should'nt want them here and open up our own "Quebec-friendly" children's hospital...
Natalie Dzepina	{6 votes}	April 28th, 2005
People don't like confusion     It is a fact that the medical system here in Montreal is going down the drain. Sections of hospitals closing in most hospital because of lack of staff. Nurses are still heading to the United States for more pay and so are the doctors. Yes the political situation here in Quebec is still not favorable to the investors and I believe that is the reason they have stalled with the Superhospital project. They keep shifting the location of the project and they are creating alot of confussion and people don't like confussion. Quebequers thought it was a bluff that the Shriners hospital was going to move to Ontario and did very little to secure there stay so we Montrealers have lost again. While you sleep some other gouvernment is making some decision that will take your well earned money and throw it out the window for more elections and reports on how they manage to screw the people of there tax dollars.
Maria Cecillia Silva	{13 votes}	April 28th, 2005
It's true London is not that bad     I went to UWO for 3 years and lived in london for 4. So yes compared to Montreal it does seem like a hick town.. but I have to admit there hospitals are quite good. Speaking from experience of course. And one can't complain about the fact that the truth is that there is always that threat of seperation here in Quebec. So i think we should just be happy that there is another facility opening which will in the end help countless people, just not people in Montreal.
Tanya Parvez	{5 votes}	April 28th, 2005
Jamie, You Forgot To Mention The Memorial Cup.......(in London this year).......     Shriners always reminded me of the episodes where Fred and Barney go to the Water Buffalo meeting while Wilma and Betty stayed home with the kids. You remember? The big hats and the secret agenda? Don't get me wrong, the Shriners do tons of great work in our communities and have a very large support system. They have also remained, fairly good at staying outside of the political arenas. (that ain't easy) They are respected and put their money where the needs of the community lay. Example: The Shriners Hospitals. 22 of them and every one of them necessary because......shh..don't tell anyone...the Province is finding it hard to find enough money to keep our health care system afloat. Note: Dalton McGuinty said as much when he asked us to start contributing a new health care payment for every working stiff to keep the injection of funds at a maximum and....wait for it......"Every dollar will go towards reducing waiting times in our hospitals". But the real mystery of our health care is how so many silent donations (including the Shriners) really are keeping things together. Without the magically appearing dollars from these sources of finding, more people would be driving south for their MRI's.
Steve Landry	{5 votes}	April 28th, 2005
Good riddence Shriners!     It is too bad for the hospital's employees, who may have to move to a boring city. But it is good news for Montrealers. The number of sick Montrealers will not decrease, but now they can be looked after in fully public hospitals. So we won't have to subsidize those little cars. The biggest downside is that this will likely kill the Shrine Bowl! The 600 or so others who attended that game in some years will no doubt share my pain.
Max Webster		May 5th, 2005

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