We are more than half way through the Pan Am Games and the Games are looking like a huge success and a wonderful showcase of all of the things that Toronto has to offer. My congratulations to everyone involved including Dr. Julia Alleyne, Medical lead for Toronto Rehab's MSK program, who is also serving as the Chief Medical Officer for both the Pan Am and Parapan Am Games. I know that many people from UHN have volunteered in a variety of ways to assist Toronto 2015 in keeping athletes healthy and fit for competition. Thank you to all UHN employees who have made adjustments and accommodations to enable us to care for patients here at UHN and to provide state-of-the-art care for athletes and visitors at the Pan Am venues.
I would like everyone to pay attention to the cost savings that Ed Rubinstein, Director, Energy & Environment, put forward last week for savings we could achieve if each of us paid just a bit of attention to our use of electricity on weekends:
"If every Staff Member, Volunteer, Researcher, Physician and anyone else I may have inadvertently forgotten turns off just five light bulbs in their office, meeting rooms, washrooms, storage rooms and other places that are going to be empty, we can save as much as $150,000. Throw in computers, faxes, printers, copiers and coffee makers, and the savings are even higher."
Indeed, we don't need to restrict this approach to a weekend practice. If we turn off electrical equipment and lights when not in use at all times, the savings would be even more. We will all need to work together to find savings that enable us to balance our budget.
I will provide more information on our budget once we've received our funding letters later this summer. We do need to keep looking at ways to make UHN more efficient so that we can maintain a healthy and balanced budget in 2015-16 and beyond.
