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Your community newspaper • Founded in 1891 • www.theprogress.com • Friday, December 17, 2010
Parkholm to offer mental health care Revamped facility provides new home for Riverview patients Robert Freeman The Progress The closure in 2002 of the 84-bed Parkholm Lodge intermediate care facility in Chilliwack separated some senior couples from each other, re-located others outside the community and sparked a series of public rallies, protests and petitions. Now the second-floor of the facility is being renovated to become home for about 20 patients from the Riverview mental institution in Coquitlam, where they were “warehoused” because of mental illness. Eight years ago, the B.C. government hatched a plan called the Riverview Redevelopment Project to “re-integrate” those patients into smaller community facilities. But the move was complicated by unforeseen economic, political and medical issues. The final closure of Riverview is not expected now until the summer of 2012. The $2.3-million in renovations underway at Parkholm is part of that project. “It will enhance a client’s dignity and respect,” Stan Kuperis, manager of mental health services in Chilliwack, Hope and Agassiz, said about the “home-like setting” planned for the new facility at a news conference Wednesday. Chilliwack MLA John Les, Chilliwack-Hope MLA Barry Penner and Chilliwack Mayor Sharon Gaetz also attended the news conference at Parkholm Lodge. Kuperis said the new facility, called Cedar Ridge, is designed for “tertiary” clients - those who are “seriously and persistently mentally ill,” the kind formerly sent to Riverview. Chilliwack currently has a full range of services for the mentally ill – except for the tertiary cases, he said. Once the Riverview clients are discharged from Cedar Ridge, the beds will be open for Chilliwack patients, if they need tertiary treatment. But until then, Kuperis said a “re-integration team” of psychiatrists and doctors and social workers will evaluate each client at Cedar Ridge to determine when they are ready to gradually return to the community. Continued: CEDAR RIDGE/ p20
Local dignitaries and guests go on a tour of the UFV campus after a funding announcement Thursday morning. JENNA HAUCK/ PROGRESS
$10M kick for campus construction Robert Freeman The Progress The University of the Fraser Valley is getting $10 million from the B.C. government to start building its new Chilliwack campus at the Canada Education Park. The renovation and expansion of the former military engineering school on the old CFB Chilliwack property is already underway with $7 million announced in April, 2009, from the federal and provincial governments. But most of that $7 million “went into the ground” for sewer and other services for the new campus, Chilliwack MLA John Les explained after the funding was announced at UFV’s Trades & Technology Centre Thursday. “This is new money,” he said, and “clearly another major step forward for the university.”
UFV president Mark Evered speaks during a funding announcement Thursday morning. JENNA HAUCK/ PROGRESS
Les, who has been working closely with UFV and provincial officials on the project since he was Chilliwack mayor, said the funding is also not connected to the recent demise of an agree-
ment to sell the old UFV campus in downtown Chilliwack. The university has a covenant with the Canada Lands Company to have $20-million worth of new campus construction underway
by September, 2011, but Les said the $10 million is not “bridging” funding so UFV can complete the move of programs from the old campus to the new campus in the education park. The $40-million campus project includes renovation of the remnants of the engineering school, construction of new buildings for classrooms, office tower, a student “town hall” and an indoor courtyard. “The best way to think about it is a community of teachers and learners all around a dynamic town square,” UFV president Mark Everett said to the university, education park and government officials gathered for the funding announcement. An “aboriginal gathering place” that will look like a traditional longhouse is also included in the plans. Continued: UFV/ p9
$1.25 12-10F CS3