Soap suds are overflowing at Cassellholme

Cassellholme officials sent a signal that they are open for business Wednesday by signing their first official contract for external service in the newly renovated Cassellholme Laundry facility. This move will see the staff process an additional 36 thousand pounds of laundry.

The contract is an agreement with DNSSAB and DNSSAB Board Chair George Jupp says the laundry is currently being done in Sudbury but the board has been aggressively looking to have the EMS laundry done locally.

“Our objections (to having laundry done in Sudbury) is the cost of transportation the convenience, the time involved to transport it and it will be so much easier to do here,” he tells reporters.

“It’s not that we were not please I think the criteria was to have it done locally, and I think that’s what is important here...to support our local businesses.”

Jupp says the EMS laundry will include uniforms and bedding supplies and that the contract is for a one year period.

Board Chair Dave Mendicino says following the retrofit to the laundry facilities in 2007 the board wanted staff to take time and adjusted to new volume of laundry being done in the facility, but after that time frame administration got marching orders to go and find other small contracts.

Mendicino says the team is looking to take on a few more small contracts but notes storage is limited which currently prevents them from taking on large scale contracts , however, the board has applied to the North East LHIN for redevelopment of their B and C long-term care beds which includes an expansion to the laundry facilities.

“We didn’t want to go gang busters initially, we wanted to get our own laundry kind of under control for a year,” he says.

“This EMS contract has been out there for a few months in terms of discussions but again we wanted to iron out any bugs that were there before we started taking on new contracts.”

Mendicino says it is gratifying to see other administrations and businesses endorsing the business case Cassellholme made to have volume laundry done locally.

“Once we were able to establish what our costs were and nail down set prices, which were pretty bang on with what we projected, it comes down to the business case,” he explains.

“It’s cheaper to do the laundry here that’s the bottom line and that’s attractive to anybody. Obviously with the way things are these days everyone’s got challenges with their own budgets and if you can save money and keep it local why not do it.”