A post in social media by a Federal election candidate indicates that there will be a public meeting held this Friday, March 18th, at 1pm at the RSL Hall in Moruya hosted by NSW Health Infrastructure.
This meeting is said to update the community on the project and to listen to concerns around the Level 4 hospital being at risk .
There may also be a visit by the NSW Health Minister to answer questions around the purchase of the land and the anomalies in the statements being made on its compulsory acquisition when compared to the revelation of the facts.
Considerations of the locations of the hospital and helipad remain the big issues.
At the recent "meet and greet" held at the end of Maunsell Street, Moruya East, the Health Infrastructure “team” identified that the site had "constraints" that forced them to locate the hospital and helipad cheek by jowl with the residential area rather than to centrally occupy the site. The constraints were revealed as flooding, bushfire buffer and "artefacts" and when asked where they were the team said they were unable to point out just where the constraints were on the map.
When asked for details around the location of the helipad the team said that at that stage they hadn’t received flightpath feedback from the authorities which translated into an idea they were throwing into the ring without any substance to confirm the site.
Given that the location of the helipad was within spitting distance of the houses, and given that the team had no confirmation of the location of the site by CASA residents found the mention of the helipad unnecessarily inflammatory, especially when the team started to field questions of why a helipad couldn't be on the hospital roof.
The response to this question was that the higher the helipad the more the noise spreads.
As to the cultural heritage areas, also not identified, it is understood that the archaeological report was only made available to local elders earlier last week.
After all the delays and secrecy and now the news of constraints, cynics might wonder why this site was chosen when such constraints were obvious from the outset.
The NSW Health Infrastructure team, and the NSW Health Minister might be confronted with some serious questions around the acquisition status, the on-selling of some of the acquired land and why, at this late stage, the community sees, for the first time, the chosen positions for the infrastructure and without convincing explanations.
Also on the table for discussion will be the apparent dislocation of the hospital with the Moruya Bypass. With the Moruya Bypass route still unknown it is clear that the linkage of the hospital remains up-in-the-air.
The community is invited to the public meeting on Friday, March 18th, at 1pm at the RSL Hall in Moruya, hosted by NSW Health Infrastructure.
Bring your questions with you
This hospital is expected to be built by 2025.
