Dear Editor
There is a survey being circulated in Ashcroft asking for peoples’ opinions on the Wellness brand. I wish to advise that I am not associated with this survey.
My opinions on the brand have been made public in the way that I do things best. By writing about it.
But the timing of this survey questionnaire is more than a little perplexing. Reminiscent of “closing the barn door after the horse has left”.
It would seem to me, that the time to have objected or questioned the branding was at least a year ago.
Ashcroft seems to have developed a habit of delayed reaction. I think of our pitiful hospital being stripped bare of its former function year after year. I think of the final reaction, years after the dismantling, when loss of our ER seemed imminent. Even then, the reaction was timid. A crowd of a couple of hundred persons in front of the hospital to express concern.. And being warned, that they only had an hour to express their views on this crucial function being threatened! And then, to cap it off, being told that the people gathered were “not there to blame anyone”! When it was more than abundantly clear that the responsibility for the downgrading and degradation of our nearly century old institution was clearly decisions made by Interior Health and its bureaucracy.
I suppose you could say that we get what we deserve. When voices that should have been raised at the time were either not heard or were insufficient.
Those who are questioning the Branding now, a year or so after the fact, have every right to do so. And to question, much less, to criticize, is not that easy to do. But the time to question and to complain is not a year or years after the fact. Be it Wellness or the dismantling of our once self-sufficient hospital, to delay reacting can only mean consequences that are not acceptable either. To you or to any one else.
Esther Darlington MacDonald
Ashcroft