Even as Stamford Hospital went public with the largest corporate donation in its history, the hospital”™s foundation is ramping up a behind-the-scenes effort to hit up other philanthropic-minded businesses and individuals in support of a massive new campus.
OdysseyRe donated $10 million to Stamford Hospital to be used toward a $575 million upgrade, which city planners hope will serve as a magnet for further development in the city”™s west end.
More than two years ago, Stamford Hospital announced a plan to overhaul its facilities over 15 years, beginning with infrastructure work this year, a new central utility plant next year and full construction gearing up in 2013.
The OdysseyRe gift will support the creation of a new emergency department that will double the number and size of exam rooms. Stamford Hospital also is planning multiple medical buildings equipped with surgical suites, inpatient rooms and other space.
“We are so fortunate that an organization of OdysseyRe”™s caliber is dedicated and committed to investing in the communities where it is based,” Brian Grissler, CEO of Stamford Hospital, said in a statement.
Stamford Hospital spokesman Scott Orstad said the institution hopes the OdysseyRe gift will encourage others to give ”“ if not quite at a matching level, in meaningful amounts that would allow the hospital to otherwise reduce amounts it would have to draw from its own cash reserves or by borrowing.
“We haven”™t really gone out to the public and started soliciting funds,” Orstad said. “The foundation has been laying the groundwork over the past year. ”¦The key would be looking for the right individuals and get a couple of those key gifts to get the program started.
“One of the things we have been fortunate in is that the economic climate has been improving,” he said. “We were fortunate (in) remaining fiscally sound, but it”™s not enough to sustain on its own the capital needed for a project of this magnitude.”
The OdysseyRe money will go toward a new emergency room with double the number of examination rooms and space as its existing ER. It was the second major grant OdysseyRe”™s foundation has awarded Stamford Hospital since 2008, when it furnished $2 million toward the purchase of a robotic da Vinci Surgical System.
OdysseyRe is a subsidiary of Fairfax Financial Holdings Ltd., a Toronto-based company that also owns Crum & Forster in Morristown, N.J. OdysseyRe underwrites reinsurance bought by other carriers to hedge their exposure to catastrophic losses. It also has its own line of specialty insurance products through its Hudson Insurance Co. unit in New York City.
OdysseyRe has 300 employees in its Americas unit spread across its Stamford headquarters and offices in New York City and Toronto. In March, OdysseyRe promoted Brian Young to CEO, replacing Andrew Barnard who took a senior leadership role at Fairfax Financial.
The Stamford Hospital gift was an especially notable one given the first-quarter hit to earnings Fairfax Financial absorbed from the disasters in the Pacific Rim. In the first quarter, Fairfax Financial recorded $311 million in Japan earthquake losses, as well as losses from the New Zealand earthquake and Australia floods that contributed to a $241 million loss for the quarter.
Additionally, it was the first quarter Fairfax Financial had reported its results under new International Financial Reporting Standards. With its investments now shown at market value under IFRS rules, that forced the company to record $102 million in net investment losses.
The company has yet to disclose any exposure it may have had to the large outbreaks of killer tornadoes in the United States this year.
