The Community Foundation of Kingston and Area (CFKA) marked the release of its annual Vital Signs report by hosting a kickoff on Monday morning (October 2) event at the Kingston Seniors Centre, which is located at a converted school on Francis Avenue (near Portsmouth) in Kingston. The location of the release in a building where seniors participate in recreational programming day in and day out fit the theme of the presentations well. The report itself points out that the local region is ahead of the national curve in terms of aging.
As of the most recent census there are more Canadians over 65 than there are children. Twenty per cent of Kingston residents are over 65 and that figure is projected to increase to 30% by 2026. With an even older population than the City of Kingston, the issues surrounding aging are also a challenge for Frontenac County. Apart from the need for more services and stresses on existing infrastructure, the region may have a labour shortage to deal with. The population of Kingston and Frontenac is projected to grow from 160,000 in 2016 to 171,000 in 2026 but the number of adults of working age (15-64) is projected to drop from 106,000 in 2016 to under 100,000 by 2026.

Housing designed for seniors at different levels of need, whether it is seniors focused rent geared to income housing, assisted living units, or beds in long term care facilities such as Fairmount Home, are all lagging behind demand currently with long wait lists in each sector.
On the other hand the report indicates that a large proportion of seniors are maintaining social and family ties, are exercising and living independent lives well into their 80’s and 90’s.
For a perspective on aging and social planning, Dr. Jennifer Ingram, a specialist in internal geriatric medicine, the founder of the Kawartha Memory clinic, and the Seniors Physician Lead with the Central East Local Health Integration Network delivered an address.
In a wide ranging talk, one of her topics was dementia. She said that dementia, on a population scale, is something that the health care system and communities of care such as families and networks of friends and neighbours are least prepared for, but that some of the research that is going on might make a difference.

“We can now identify dementia when it is coming. We can distinguish dementia from normal aging, and we can now do this up to 15 years before the decline in cognition is apparent. It is similar to identifying and treating people when they are in a pre-diabetic state.
“We need to change our thinking, we need a dementia strategy that calls for supports and a better dementia workforce, which includes changes in primary care,” she said.
She also said that she agrees with the current government’s reluctance to build more long term care beds to deal with a bubble of need that will eventually pass.
“We built schools on a massive scale and now we are closing them and leaving empty buildings and we don’t want to do that with long term care.

“The solution is to provide supports for seniors, families and caregivers to continue living at home. The costs are so much lower and the outcomes are better,” she said.
Paul Charbonneau, Chief of Frontenac Paramedic Services talked about the paramedicine initiatives on Wolfe Island and elsewhere in the county that the service he manages have been able to start up, and about the movement towards making more use of the skills of paramedics for health promotion.
“The program has been taken up by the Ministry of Health” he said. Paramedicine programs were first developed in Australia and were pioneered in Ontario in Renfrew County. Frontenac Paramedic Services operates a clinic on Wolfe Island and they work with Rural and Southern Frontenac Community Services to meet with senior’s at Diners events each month.

The report card aspect of this years’ Vital Signs Report is not as important as it may have been in previous years, because the premise of the report is that issues around aging well are going to be front and centre in the minds of social service agencies, the health care system, municipal governments and so many others over the next 10 to 20 years that the intent of this report is more to identify issues that will been to be addressed rather than evaluate how well the systems that are currently in place are faring.
That being said, some current gaps in the system were identified, particularly as regards housing.

At the Denbigh meeting of Addington Highlands Council on Monday night, Reeve Henry Hogg and Deputy Reeve Helen Yanch reported that Lennox and Addington County appears set to re-visit its commitment to maintaining a 12 hour a day ambulance service based in Denbigh and build a new base to house that service.

“The new CAO of the County [Brenda Orchard] has some ideas about replacing the ambulance with an emergency first response vehicle. That vehicle would not be able to cross county lines like an ambulance so there are implications for our neighbours, and there are big implications for our own residents as well because those vehicles can’t take patients to hospital,” said Reeve Hogg.

“Mark [Chief of Paramedic Services Mark Shjerning] has looked at it and does think it is viable, but I know that it is being pushed for sure,” said Yanch. “My thoughts are that the CAO of the county should sit down with our ambulance committee and talk to them.”
“When is this going to come up?” asked Councillor Bill Cox.
“November, I think,” said Hogg.
“Maybe Tony [Councillor Tony Fritsch] should approach the CAO, as chair of our ambulance committee, and ask if there is anything formal coming up about this, because we haven’t heard anything about it,” said Cox.

Reeve Hogg said “They are wearing us down with this. It comes up at least once a term, and it never seems to end.”
Hogg’s assertion. In 2012 the service was cut in half, from a 24 to a 12 hour service. In January 2016 a staff report at L&A County proposed cutting the service entirely. This was not acted upon by Council and in November, 2016 a search was initiated for a suitable piece of land to build a permanent base in Denbigh, but that base has not been built as of yet.

“They said at our county meeting last week that the new base was ‘not a priority for the former CAO’ [Larry Keech] which confirmed what I always thought was going on,” said Yanch.
“I’m sure County Council is tired of hearing from us and from Denbigh residents over and over about this,” said Fritsch.
“They are wearing us down,” said Hogg.
“Doesn’t the south already have what they want,” asked Bill Cox, referring to a new base that was built in 2016 in Loyalist Township.
“They are buying land right now in Stone Mills for a base,” said Hogg.

Currently there are two 24 hour ambulances based in Napanee, and 24 hour ambulances based in Odessa (Loyalist Township) and Northbrook (Addington Highlands) in addition to a 12 hour service based in a temporary station in Denbigh.
Those who have advocated for closing the Denbigh base talk about the lack of calls for service in the remote rural area, tying up personnel and equipment.

Those who advocate for keeping the service talk about distance and the role the Denbigh service plays in serving a large under-served area in neighbouring jurisdictions (Renfrew and Frontenac Counties) as well as Lennox and Addington.
The Denbigh service was initially set up by the Province of Ontario because of the communities location at the junction of two provincially significant arterial roads (Hwy.’s 41 and 28) in order to serve the vast, underpopulated region. Ever since ambulance service was downloaded and the Denbigh service has come under the budget of Lennox and Addington County, questions about its financial viability have been raised. Overtures to Frontenac and Renfrew Counties’ to help fund the service, beyond paying a fee for service for cross-border calls, have been rebuffed.

Other items from AH Council

Waste Disposal fees
A revised waste disposal fee schedule was presented to Council. It includes a fee of $15 for a truck or single axle trailer load, $30 for a dual axle load, and fees of $35 for a trailer/truck load of shingles, $100 for fiberglass boats, etc. Clear AH logo bags are required for all waste not covered in the schedule, and tires, e-waste and freon-free appliances can be disposed of for free. Large loads of construction waste, anything larger than a dual axle trailer, are no longer accepted at Addington Highlands Waste sites.
The new schedule will be presented to waste site attendants for comment, and will be back before Council for adoption, likely at the October 2 meeting at 1pm in Flinton.
Fees waived for NAEC
In response to a request from North Addington Education Centre staff, fees for use of the Flinton Hall for Christmas and Spring formals, and for use of the ball diamond rink for tournaments and other uses, will no longer be charged to the student council.
Ontario Community Infrastructure Fund Top up Component application.
AH has applied for a $877,500 to cover 90% of the costs to rehabilitate 2.8 kilometres of the Mattawatchan Road, which runs north from Buckshot Lake Road into Renfrew County. If approved the township will be required to find the other $97,500 in the $975,000 project.
Addressing concerns at Weslmkoon Lake – After an ambulance had great difficulty finding an island resident on Weslmkoon Lake, CAO Christine Reed said the township needs to look at re-doing the insufficient and inaccurate civic addressing system on the lake. The project will be slow and expensive as the lake has over 100 islands and 50 of them contain cottages, but Reed said it is something that the township needs to get started on, and council agreed.
Dog Strangling vine not accepted at waste sites
On the recommendation of Public Works Supervisor Brett Reavie, the township will not accept the invasive plant “Dog Strangling Vine” at waste sites. Residents are encourage to deal with the plant themselves.

Ten years ago Frontenac County Council committed $540,000 over ten years to help fund the re-development project at Kingston General Hospital and the Cancer Care Centre of Eastern Ontario. In the spring, the fund raisers from the University Kingston Hospitals Kingston foundation came back to Frontenac County with an update about the kinds of upgrades that are being planned for the hospital over the next few years, and said they would be back with a formal funding request.

They came back this week, and the ask is $200,000, which is what the presenters back in the spring predicted it would be. On a per-capita basis, if Frontenac County Council agrees to the request, its residents will be paying, on the basis of number of hospital visits per resident per year, the same as the City of Kingston pays. Looking at it another way, with 40,000 visits per year, Frontenac County would be kicking in $5 per resident visit as an annual donation.

While this seems like a large increase for the foundation to ask for, the request is actually lower than it was in 2007, when they asked for $220,000 per year of the council of that day. Council decided to pay just under 1/4 of the amount requested, $54,000 per year.
Council is expected to consider the request when they consider their 2018 budget later in the fall.

A popular swimming hole has been closed by the Ministry of the Environment and Climate Change.
Gilmour Point in Battersea was officially closed Aug. 30 due to possible blue-green algae in Dog Lake. The beach is located at the end of Wellington Street and is a busy summer gathering place for local families.
“It’s not uncommon for there to be challenges on Dog Lake,” confirms Wayne Orr, Chief Administrative Officer (CAO) for South Frontenac Township.

A public servant with the township for eight years, Orr says the closure only impacted the last two-week-session of children’s programs at the beach.
Of the townships four public beaches, Gilmour Point is the only one closed. Samples were taken at the beach and were submitted to a lab for analysis. As of press time, results were still unknown.
Speaking on behalf of the Kingston, Frontenac, Lennox & Addington Public Health Unit on Sept. 6, Andrew Girouard says the turnaround time for testing is 10 to 14 days.

An experienced health inspector, Girouard has seen blooms in Kingston and other parts of the health unit’s catchment area.

“We want to educate people more, to take their own precautions,” says the Manager of the Environmental Health Team about the potentially harmful blooms. “I think this (Gilmour Point Beach) is a case where it’s so visible and present, people won’t go in that water.”
According to officials, cyanobacteria, commonly called blue-green algae, are primitive microscopic organisms that have inhabited the earth for more than two billion years. They are bacteria, but have features in common with algae.
Blue-green algae occur naturally in a wide variety of environments including ponds, rivers, lakes and streams. During an algal bloom, people are encouraged to avoid activities such as swimming and bathing in water near the bloom to reduce the risk of exposure to algal toxins.
“We want the public to be aware this bloom exists and not go into the water,” says Girouard who calls the blooms a product of heavy rains and warm weather.
“As soon as the water temperature changes, it will make a difference,” confirms the township CAO.

Located a few minutes from the lake where he worked as a fishing guide, Storrington Councillor Ron Sleeth notes, “Dog Lake turns over every year. This is a natural occurrence.”
Describing the lake as drowned land from the building of the Rideau Canal, the well-known community activist notes, “The problem appears to be worse this year due to the heavy volume of rainfall. The water level is extremely high for this time of year.”
To protect residents against possible exposure, people are encouraged to take a cautious approach if they encounter a blue-green algal bloom which can be dense and solid-looking clumps. Fresh blooms often smell like newly mown grass and older blooms may smell like rotting garbage.
Although many varieties of blue-green algae are harmless, some can produce toxins that are harmful to the health of humans and animals.

During an algal bloom, health experts recommend avoiding activities such as swimming and bathing in water near the bloom to reduce the risk of exposure to algal toxins. Residents are encouraged to contact the health unit for swimming advisories as well as information on health risks associated with the blooms.
If you suspect a blue-green algal bloom:

• assume toxins are present

• avoid using the water

• restrict pet and livestock access to the water, and

• call the Ministry’s Spills Action Centre at 1-800-268-6060.