Project and Campaign Making Healthy Progress
Having closed the bidding process in May, the MUHC continues to make progress in identifying the professional firms that will undertake construction at the Glen campus and renovations at the Mountain campus. The successful bids for Project Manager, Master Architect and Master Engineers will be announced later in the fall. At the same time, PricewaterhouseCoopers, the firm engaged by the MUHC and the government to evaluate public private partnership and conventional models of financing for the project, continues its work in close consultation with the MUHC’s Planning Office. Their final report is expected in December.
The naming of professional firms will constitute an unmistakable milestone in the redevelopment of the MUHC. For anyone who has recently visited our hospitals, however, it is clear from the sight of ongoing work that outstanding patient care remains at the heart of the MUHC. Many important projects are in the works, such as the much-needed replacement of high-tech diagnostic and treatment equipment at the Royal Victoria, Montreal General and Montreal Neurological hospitals, improvements to the Intensive Care Unit at the Montreal Chest Institute, and renovations to the Emergency at the Children’s. The main equipment has been standardized in our central labs and we are gearing up for a robotic line at the Royal Vic’s lab that will improve operational efficiency dramatically.
In tandem with the project’s accelerating pace, the Best Care for Life campaign also gained ground over the summer months. Several important gifts arrived through each of the campaign’s partner foundations, and a number of events, including installments of the MUHC Foundation’s highly successful New Faces, New Ideas lecture series and the third Montreal Charity Poker Championship brought the campaign message to wider and more diverse audiences. We continue to work closely with our colleagues at the Foundation of the Centre hospitalier de l’Université de Montréal (CHUM) on concluding the organization of the Joint Corporate Campaign. The groundwork for this unprecedented collaboration is now nearly complete, and we expect to advance the Joint Corporate Campaign significantly in the next few months.
Finally, the Best Care for Life Family Campaign, which aims to engage MUHC employees in our fundraising efforts, is making great strides, with a second Employee Lottery, a silent auction and other staff-driven events raising the campaign’s profile and generating enthusiasm for the project among those who will most immediately reap its benefits. Support from employees is key to the campaign’s success as it sends a vital message to the community at large that the campaign is moving forward, that its goals are critical and that it must be supported.
