Jeff Green | Aug 12, 2020


Kingston City Council was relatively calm, resigned, dissappointed, and a tad, ok more than a tad, self righteous on Tuesday Night when, following the lead of Mayor Paterson, they agreed to turn the other cheek and abandon any attempts to reason with Frontenac County over how much City ratepayers will have to pay each year for land ambulance service and Fairmount Home.

The tad self righteous part came from Mayor Paterson himself when he used the phrase “in the interest of transparency. The more than a tad part came from Deputy Mayor Jim Neill, “this is taxation without representation,” as if he was launching the Kingston Tea Party or something.

The council does have a point. They pay the lions share of the municipal costs for the two services (the province pays about half the ambulance costs and more than half of Fairmount Home costs)

Frontenac County pays a much smaller share, but their council sets the budget for the two services.

From what Kingston City Councillors seemed to be saying on Tuesday Night, they would like to have a seat on the board of Frontenac Paramedic Services (FPS) and a seat on the board of Fairmount Home, just like the County sends a representative to the board of the Kingston Housing Corporation, and has four seats on the Public Library Board.

It would be a fair ask, except for the fact that FPS and Fairmount Home are not overseen by boards. They report directly to Frontenac County Council, so that won’t work

The other thing that Kingston City Council has been asking for is, essentially, at least the appearance of the ability to bargain.

They feel that they asked for a 2.5% increase, and the counter offer was 10%. City staff then went and found enough money to pay 7%, a pretty good offer if the county was in a mood to bargain.

In response, the county explained why they services required exactly what they were charging for them, which was not really what the city was looking for.

It’s like you are buying a car and when you ask for a deal, the dealer tells you in more and more detail how much work and materials went in to making the car, and does not budge on the price at all. And it as if they were the only car dealer you could by from, and the option of not buying a car was not on the table.

City Council, like the car buyer, is not interested in detailed information, they want a deal, even a small deal, to feel they are being taken seriously.

When you add the inevitable urban chauvinism factor, the idea that a bunch of hicks are lording some old agreement over the Council of the Limestone City, the former capital of Canada, you can see how this does not sit well with the council.

For Frontenac County Council, the two services make up over half its annual spending, employ the majority of county employees. Without them, the counties’ role would be extremely limited. They are points of pride, and attempts to rein in spending are so rare as to be the stuff of legend

The budgets for the two services are explained in detail to Frontenac County Council, but almost never challenged.

County staff do provide comparison costs to other jurisdictions. Frontenac Paramedic Services is in the middle of the pack, in terms of costs, in Eastern Ontario.

Fairmount is on the higher end, but has a lower per patient cost than Rideaucrest, the facility that is owned by the City of Kingston.

Ironically, this move by Kingston City Council gives them even less input into the funding for these services. They will no longer receive even an explanation about the costs.

With his motion, Mayor Paterson has accomplished a lot, in political terms. He has extricated city staff from having to deal with this issue, he has saved the legal costs for both his and the counties’ ratepayers, and has claimed the moral high ground.

Aside from the not so nice things that were said around the council table in Kingston, this is a big win for Frontenac County. They get the money and don’t have to deal with Kingston City Council on these funding matters anymore.

The City and the County aren’t exactly reconciled, but this dispute is over, at least for this crop of councillors.

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