Robert Fisher
Staff Reporter
RENFREW – Two former chairs of the Renfrew Victoria Hospital (RVH) board of directors and RVH Foundation (RVH) board issued a statement June 23 responding to the final report from the supervisor appointed in 2024 to review operations at the hospital in the wake of findings which suggested “irregular” financial transactions within the organization and a connected third-party entity called Renfrew Health (RH). The Gazette reported on the supervisor report in our June 18 edition.
The former chairs, Keanan Stone (RVH) and Jim Lemenchick (RVHF) originally issued their statement only to two local media outlets. The Gazette asked for and received a copy Monday.
The two state, about the supervisor’s report, “it is unfortunate that greater context was not shared surrounding past decisions made by our boards of directors, informed by expert counsel in accountants and lawyers at the time, which has resulted in so much backlash and negativity being stirred up in our community.”
Altaf Stationwala was the supervisor appointed to oversee the hospital and investigate the financial arrangements between the hospital and Renfrew Health. He stated, in his report, the board of directors, “failed to ask the right questions and focus on the right issues.” His report noted, with respect to the external audit and accounting firm, “had questionable audit practices, including the decision to leave RH out from RVH financial statements.”
Stone and Lemenchick wrote that their mission was for the hospital to provide top-quality care and be a, “model of excellence in health care,” and they made, “every effort to support the safety and well-being of all individuals within our environment.” They state the board “championed” innovation and collaboration, “to anticipate and respond to the changing needs of our community in a fiscally responsible manner (emphasis added).”
The statement discusses the history of the hospital having a small emergency room to the, “state of the art emergency and ambulatory care centre,” the hospital has today.
The “world class” nephrology centre, diabetes education, oncology, breast screening programs, improved surgical and radiology departments and sleep lab, along with new buildings for physicians would not have happened, the statement suggests, without “good planning.” In growing the hospital, “every infrastructure investment, every program enhancement, every penny saved for every major change was strategic, planed out years in advance and executed with expert precision.” The work was done, “under the guidance of a highly sough after CEO (and senior management team).”
The staff who were brought in, “were the best,” the former chairs wrote and the hospital was “challenged” to retain them. “The funding climate for health care was (and still is) complex, they deserved to be compensated for a job well done and we believe they were never paid more than they deserved,” they state, ignoring the issues of double compensation and diverted funds raised in the Stationwala report.
“At all times we believed we were making the right, informed decisions,” to provide “outstanding” and “unprecedented” rural health care.
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