It appears the Health Minister will soon be making a trip to Ashcroft to visit the local hospital.

Ashcroft Mayor Barbara Roden says that comes after a meeting on Tuesday with Adrian Dix at the Union of BC Municipalities convention.

“The Health Minister, there’s not much he can say or do, but he certainly is sympathetic to our plight, he knows all about it. And he did say, as he announced on the radio earlier this year, that he is coming to Ashcroft. Probably next week or the week after. So we’ll get him on the ground in Ashcroft, allow him to talk to some of the people at the hospital and the health site and he can see for himself what’s happening.”

Roden says Ashcroft is looking for stable hours for staff in its emergency room, and for transparency from Interior Health about the future of the local hospital.

“There are all sorts of theories and rumours going around the community about the reason for the closures and what is going to happen in the future, and in the summer, myself and another council member and our CAO travelled over to Kelowna and spoke with Interior Health CEO Susan Brown, and asked if Interior Health could come over and have a public meeting, so that they could speak directly with people in the community.”

Roden says that meeting will be going ahead on Oct. 17, and she points out that will be more than three months after her delegation met with Interior Health, back in June.