The move from the Souris Valley Extended Care Centre into the new Tatagwa View facility has been running fairly smoothly, the Sun Country Health Region board of trustees heard at their monthly meeting on Wednesday.

As of Friday, eight of the 12 houses at Tatagwa View were occupied by residents from Souris Valley. The offices and administrative areas at Tatagwa View are also now occupied.

Laundry services will likely be moving in this week. The in-patient mental health clients housed at Souris Valley have not yet moved to Tatagwa View, but will be doing so this month.

Much of the facility has now been furnished, though some touch-ups and remedial work is needed for the next month or so. To that end, some sub-contractors will likely be on site to finish up their work.

"So far, it's been going pretty good," said Lloyd Searcy, VP of Corporate and Financial Services for Sun Country.

Searcy said he's talked to some of the staff and residents. Generally, their impression has been very positive with the new building.

Asked when the move will be completely done, Searcy said it should be done by mid-March, noting that Sun Country will still be in Souris Valley insomuch that renovations will be done to the old library building.

The library building will be used to house maintenance services.

The Sun Country Health Region continued to run in the black in its third financial quarter, even managing a small surplus of over $243,000, according to financial statements presented at the health board meeting on Wednesday.

Lloyd Searcy, VP of Corporate and Financial Services, said the health region was in the black as of Dec. 31, 2004.

Searcy noted the health region will be making some large payments related to Tatagwa View before the end of the year, but from a cash perspective, the health region is quite healthy at the moment, he said.

"Certainly we have enough cash to meet our obligations without dipping into the line of credit, likely to the end of the year," he said.

It should be noted that a surplus of over $243,000 is very small compared to the health region's overall budget. In 2003-2004, the Sun Country budget was over $87 million, according to the region's annual report.

The health region also had a small surplus at the end of the third quarter last year.

In related news, the health region received a small boost recently from the provincial government, which gave the region $470,000 for infrastructure improvements.

The additional money comes out of the incremental funding pledged by the federal government at the 2004 First Ministers' Meeting. Saskatchewan has received $66 million this fiscal year, to be distributed among the 12 health regions.

The bulk of the money will go to the Estevan Regional Nursing Home, to be used for a new nurse call system, fire code upgrades and HVAC upgrades. It will also go to partial roof replacements at facilities in Carlyle and Oxbow.