Kemp Care Network has been raising funds for the project through a capital campaign. Pictured: Donor Paul Paletta with Kemp hospice chief executive officer Danielle Zuccet and board chair Janice Shearer. Photo Credit: Kemp Care Network.
Kemp Care Network, which operates Hamilton’s Dr. Bob Kemp Hospice, is seeking to build the city’s first children’s hospice.
Hamilton has the Ronald McDonald House where families of sick or seriously ill children can stay while their family member is treated at McMaster Children’s Hospital.
But the city of Hamilton does not have a children’s hospice where families and their terminally ill child can stay while living out their last days.
Kemp Care Network has been raising funds for the project through a capital campaign.
Their goal is to raise $25 million, which has already been helped significantly by a $5 million donation from local developer and philanthropist Paul Paletta and a $2.5 million contribution from the Government of Ontario.
The organization is reportedly at 50 per cent of their fundraising goal and continues to make progress.
Hamilton City Council also recently voted to direct staff to formulate documents to provide the land for the facility on a 49-year lease at a significantly discounted annual rate of $25,000.
The hospice will be located next to the Wentworth Lodge long-term care home in Dundas on South Street West which is about a six minute drive from McMaster Children’s Hospital.
McMaster Children’s Hospital serves 500,000 children across a region of over 2.3 million people including Grey County, Dufferin County, Wellington County, Halton Region, Waterloo Region, Brant County, Haldimand County, Niagara Region, and Norfolk County.
Likewise, the new children’s hospice would primarily service residents across those regions.
The official name for the building will be “Keaton’s House – Paul Paletta Children’s Hospice.”
Keaton is the son of Danielle Zucchet, the CEO of the Kemp Care Network. Keaton died in 2010 at the age of seven after three years of chemotherapy and radiation treatments.
Kemp Care Network says that the new facility will “complement existing medical and social programs, bridge the gap between hospital visits and home care and provide services that neither the hospital nor an adult hospice offers.”
It will feature one wing with 10 bedrooms for children needing end-of-life care and one wing for community-based grief and bereavement support services.
In the 10-bedroom wing family members will be able to stay with their child.
The facility will also have space for day wellness programs, respite care for families, and a specialized area where families can stay with their child after death.
Paletta, who says he hopes to “inspire everyone to give what they can” to help fund the project, added, “When I found out that Greater Hamilton was unique, in that we have one of the world’s best children’s hospitals yet no children’s hospice to match the kind of care children need when facing serious illness, I knew I had to help fix this.”
“Vancouver, Calgary, Ottawa, Montreal and Toronto families benefit from this essential support- the Hamilton area should be no different,” he continued.
Kemp Care Network continues to raise funds for the new hospice. Donations can be made online at www.keatonshouse.org.
Based in Hamilton, he reaches hundreds of thousands of people monthly on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, and Twitter. He has been published in The Hamilton Spectator, Stoney Creek News, and Bay Observer. He has also been a segment host with Cable 14 Hamilton. In 2017, he received the Chancellor Full Tuition Scholarship from the University of Ottawa (BA, 2022). He has also received the Governor General’s Academic Medal. He formerly worked in a non-partisan role on Parliament Hill in Ottawa.
