Photo: Becky Kavanaugh and Pam Lemke of Land O'Lakes Community Services

Thanks to a grant totaling $3000, which was received from the Napanee District Community Foundation (NDCF) and the Mazinaw Community Fund, the Land O'Lakes Community Services (LOLCS), located in Northbrook, will be able to offer new and improved services to individuals in the local community.

One LOLCS program that will benefit from the grant is the Community Support Program, which will now be able to offer a new homemaking program to seniors and physically challenged individuals in the community who require assistance with basic homemaking. The new program will get $2000 to support 30 individuals/families by matching them with local homemakers, who will assist in their homes with a number of basic tasks, including cleaning and meal preparation and also with one-time jobs.

The program, which was started in April of 2011, is currently serving 22 individuals in the community. Pam Lemke, the community support program coordinator with LOLCS, was thrilled and very grateful when she was presented with the grant at the NDCF's AGM in late June of this year. “This grant will go along way in helping seniors stay in their homes by allowing them to receive the essential and basic homemaking services they need to keep them there,” she said.

The remaining $1000 in grant funds will augment the existing LOLCS child and youth transportation program, which provides transportation to children and youth who must travel to medical appointments and to other community and school events. LOLCS offers a myriad of other services designed to help seniors and people with disabilities remain in their homes. Their other programs include caregiver support, Meals on Wheels, and social and dining services. For more information about the Community Support Program contact Pam Lemke at 613-336-8934 ext. 229; toll free at 1-877-679-6636. For more information about the Child and Youth Transportation program contact Becky Kavanaugh at 613-336-8934 ext 257.

After hearing two presentations concerning the need to keep the Denbigh ambulance service, Lennox and Addington County deferred a proposal to begin the process of finding a location for a new base in the Northbrook/Cloyne vicinity.

The Northbrook base, which is located in a rental property, must be vacated within two years, and in a report to Council, County Emergency Services staff recommended “engaging the services of an architect to assist staff and council in determining the land requirements”, and at the same time make landowners with suitable properties located between Northbrook and Cloyne aware that the County is looking to buy property.

“Isn’t this is a little premature, given that the Denbigh base is not yet decided?” asked Bill Cox, a member of L&A County Council from Addington Highlands. A motion to defer consideration of the staff report was accepted and the matter will return at the September 14 county meeting in Napanee.

Janice Powell, Executive Director of the Lakelands Family Health Team, which is based in Northbrook and operates a satellite clinic in Denbigh, made the first presentation.

She started by saying: “The Denbigh ambulance was started in 1982 by the province because it was necessary. The need has not gone away.”

She then took exception to a claim that was made in a consultant’s report, which was received by the County in June. The report, by the IBI group, recommended shutting the Denbigh base and opening a new base in Loyalist Township.

The report is an update of a report from 2008, and claims that the addition of the Family Health Team to Addington Highlands is an improvement in service that will alleviate the impact of the closing the ambulance base.

“The Lakelands Family Health Team is a family practice which focuses on chronic care. Neither the main site nor the satellite in Denbigh offer emergency clinics,” she said. “It is somewhat deceiving that the IBI group cites Lakelands in the context of an emergency services report … we request that all references to Lakelands be removed from the report.”

She added that if the Denbigh base is removed, “Ambulance response times will be greater than 30 minutes, 80 per cent of the time. The survival of patients rostered to the Family Health Team hangs in the balance.”

In her presentation, Vennachar resident Rosemary O’Connor said, “I find it strangely curious that a consultant who failed to consult the stakeholders has recommended that an ambulance base be closed. The very thought of closure leaves me filled with dread.”

She went on to describe how her husband Barney developed post-stroke seizure syndrome in 1998, and ended up requiring ambulance calls on several occasions for transport to Victoria Hospital in Renfrew.

“The first time I called he was in very bad shape. The response time from Denbigh was very good, but it was touch and go when we got to the hospital. The second time was good also, but on the third call the ambulance came from Northbrook and it took a long time. If that first ambulance had come 30 minutes later than it did, he might well have died in the ambulance. Fifteen years later Barney is still here with us, able to live at home and enjoy a reasonably good quality of life.”

Before moving forward with any planning for a new base in Northbrook, Emergency Services have been requested to prepare a response to the presentations by Janice Powell and Rosemary O’Connor.

An infusion of cash for a province-wide initiative to combat homelessness will allow Southern Frontenac Community Services (SFCS) to solidify some programming, provide counseling and make it easier for families facing poverty and housing challenges across Frontenac County to access support programs.

The $20,000 grant is coming from an unusual source, the Greater Simcoe County United Way, which came forward with a Request for Proposal process for homelessness prevention projects throughout the province. SFCS answered the request for Frontenac County, and received the $20,000.

“This funding will greatly improve the ability of SFCSC to deliver our community services, including the applications and processing for programs such as Rent and Utility Banks, Food Security Programs (Good Food Box, Food Bank, and Meals on Wheels), Community Caring Fund and Consolidated Homelessness Prevention Program,” said David Townsend, SFCSC’s Executive Director.

According to Kate Hulton, Family Services Coordinator for the agency, the funds will be used to combat rural homelessness in three key areas:

The Rural Women’s Group, a monthly support group, will be re-instated in August of 2011. This program aims to combat the isolation of rural living and provides support and informative educational sessions on topics such as: mental health, budgeting, healthy eating, parenting, and helping to break the cycle of abusive relationships;

Specific housing pages will be added to the www.sfcsc.ca website, providing timely and accurate housing information for both potential tenants and landlords;

The Hydro LEAP Program (a low-income Energy Assistance Program) will be expanded, making accessing LEAP much easier and effective for SFCSC’s clients.

Ongoing case management from SFCSC’s staff will ensure that recently housed and at-risk households remain housed, preventing further setbacks. Additional services will include the provision of six-months to one-year of follow-up and case management for the agency’s recently housed clients, through advocacy, referrals, assistance with filling out forms, applications, budgeting and other individualized support.

All three project components will be operational by September 1, 2011 and will be ongoing. This funding will provide direct access to more than 200 families each year.

While most of SFCS’ programming is focused on residents of South Frontenac and North Kingston, the homelessness initiative is a county-wide project.

For more information regarding the above services and programs, people can contact Kate Hulton directly at 613-376-6477 ext. 31; Residents living north of Verona in the catchment area of Northern Frontenac Community Services (NFCS) can call 613-279-3150 for a referral.

In other news from SFCS, programming for seniors will begin being delivered at the Grace Centre on August 8, as the agency gradually centralizes its operations in its new home.

Photo: Joan Cameron, chair of  SFCSC

Building projects and serving the elderly were central to the presentations at the annual general meetings of both Land O'Lakes Community Services (LOLCS) and Southern Frontenac Community Services (SFCSC) last week.

It was no coincidence that the meetings took place at about the same time. One of the major funders for both agencies, the Local Health Integration Network of South Eastern Ontario (LHINS), controls the funding for a basket of seniors' support programs from the Ministry of Health and Long Term Care that they both offer. The LHINS insists that all the agencies they fund hold their annual meetings in June each year.

Land O’Lakes Community Services – At the LOLCS meeting, which was held at the Northbrook Lions Hall on June 21, Board Chair Jane Muston took some extra time to thank the staff at the agency for all their hard work over the past year.

“There is always so much to do, and less money to work with, and it is our staff that go above and beyond to make sure everything gets done at the end of the day,” she said.

“Change is inevitable in the social services,” Muston added,

“and we must be ready for change at all times. Who knows, maybe there will be a change of government this fall. ”

A guest speaker had to cancel at the last minute, so North Frontenac Mayor Bud Clayton filled in, in his role as chair of the Pine Meadow Nursing Home Management Committee.

Clayton reported that a meeting has been scheduled for later in the week with provincial officials to discuss the budget for the Pine Meadow redevelopment project. “It seems we need to cut $1 million from the project,” Clayton said, “which sounds more serious than it is. We do have room to cut.”

One of the pieces of the project that seems to be the most expendable is the plan to build a public access dialysis clinic.

“Even though there are 11 patients in our immediate area who are travelling to Kingston every few days for dialysis, more people needing the service in the surrounding region`, and potentially a lot more when our population swells in the summer, Kingston General Hospital has shown no interest in providing a satellite clinic at Pine Meadow,” said Clayton. “So not building a dialysis clinic is a way to save money.”

Clayton said that any cuts to the project would be done in such a way that they could easily be added on later, if the funding can be found. He is optimistic that the project will be able to break ground later this year.

Strategic Plan and Grace Centre for SFSCS

Joan Cameron, the chair of the SFCSC, said that when she first heard about the agency entering into an agreement to purchase the 150-year-old Grace United Church in Sydenham and turn it into a permanent home, “My first instinct was to run as fast as I could in the opposite direction. That view was shared by our executive director. But now that it is happening I'm finding myself becoming obsessed with this project.”

The breakfast AGM, which was held on June 22, took place in the basement of the new Grace Centre, which is being converted into program space.

“This space will be the new home of our adult day programs, and will also be available for community events,” said SFCS Executive Director David Townsend.

The pews have been removed from the sanctuary of the church, opening a large, bright space that “is full of potential” according to Townsend. “For us to build a centre of this size and capacity from scratch would cost $2.5 million. This project, when it is all completed, will cost $350,000.”

To help with the necessary fundraising, a new staff position of fund developer has been created.

At the same time as the Grace Centre plan was being developed, Southern Frontenac Community Services has been revamping its service offerings.

“Instead of chasing money and providing services based on what as can find funding for, we are dedicated to providing a more focussed range of services well,” said David Townsend.

This means the agency will be focussing mainly on providing services for seniors, and developing partnerships to serve other segments of the population.

The Frontenac Community Futures Development Corporation held their annual business breakfast at the Verona Lions Hall to celebrate the successes of local businesses, many of which have benefited from the Eastern Ontario Development Program (EODP). The EODP is an economic development initiative aimed at addressing the socio-economic challenges in rural eastern Ontario.

According to Anne Prichard, executive director of the FCFDC, a total of 75 EODP projects have helped local businesses to grow in this past year alone.

The program, which began in 2006, has made available $10 million a year to rural eastern Ontario businesses by offering a number of programs, including skills development, youth internships, access to capital, and business planning. Since the FCFDC's inception in 2004, local businesses have tapped into $4,798,000 for various EOPD projects. Since the beginning of the FCDFC's fiscal year on July 1, 2010, local area businesses have received $710,000 in funding programs, which has helped to create 37 new jobs while maintaining another 63. Beneficiaries of this past year’s EODP programs included the County of Frontenac, which was able to hire three youth interns.

In skills development projects, Northern Connections of Sharbot Lake and the Eastern Ontario Forest Group were able to receive skills training. Under business planning the Frontenac Farmers Market, Wintergreen Studios, the RKY Camp in Parham and the Land O'Lakes Tourist Association were able to develop their business plans. Other businesses that benefited from other local initiative projects included the National Farmers’ Union's Open Barns Tour, the Bellrock Community Hall Association, the Verona Lions and the Verona Cattail Festival, the Eastern Ontario Trails Alliance, the Frontenac Arch Biosphere and the Sharbot Lake Legion.

The EODP also helped to fund the new library in Sydenham; Oaisys Medical, a business that specializes in medical imaging; and Hammer This Home, a home renovation business in Harrowsmith.

While the breakfast celebrated this past year’s successes, the question of future EOPD funding remains up in the air. An announcement was made on in May 2009 by the Minister of Industry, Tony Clement, for a two-year investment in the EODP totaling $20 million, but that commitment remains up in the air for the 2011/2012 fiscal year due to the stalling of the federal budget as a result of the upcoming election. This comes at a bad time for local businesses looking for student interns, skills training and generally making plans to expand their businesses with renovations, since funding may not be available now until October.

While the FCFDC is no longer receiving applications for EODP-funded programs, their regular business counseling and lending services are still available to area businesses.

Anne Prichard is optimistic that the EOPD funding will eventually come through. “It is in the budget for another two years at $10 million a year, so it is just a waiting game now but that being said it comes at a bad time for businesses looking to expand in any number of ways.”

In the meantime, Anne is encouraging local businesses to continue to use the services at the FCFDC, and for those who have EOPD projects in mind, she recommends that they have their applications ready to submit should the funding go through any time soon. 

Southern Frontenac Community Services (SFCS) have secured a deal for a lease-to-purchase agreement to move their seniors’ programming and administrative offices to the former Grace United Church in Sydenham.

This will create the first permanent home for the 20-year-old agency, which is now focussing its efforts on providing services for seniors and social supports for working families in South Frontenac.

Until now, SFCS has been based at a rental property in Sydenham, which is called the Rural Visions Centre. They also provide programming at the United Church manse in Harrowsmith, but are planning to consolidate their operations at the Grace United Church.

The church held its final services on May 16 of last year. Negotiations with SFCS commenced in October and the plan went public in an article in the News in November of last year.

“We have a community partnership with the YWCA of Kingston for this venture,” said David Townsend, SFCS Executive Director, “and Anne Kloosterman from the Y is here with us tonight.”

Townsend estimated that the cost of purchase and renovations at the church would come to about $300,000. “We will be fund-raising, seeking grants, and using our reserve funds to come up with that money over time,” Townsend said.

For the first phase, he said $100,000 would be needed.

His request to South Frontenac Council was modest, however.

“We ask that the township provide us with a grant of $2,000 each year for five years so we can cover municipal taxes, and continue to forego the money that the township has not been receiving in property taxes for the 140 years that the church has been on that site,” he said. (Churches do not pay property taxes in South Frontenac)

Joan Cameron, the chair of the Board of SFCS, also asked that the township appoint a member of council to sit on the SFCS Board.

Mayor Davison said the timing of the grant request was good because council will be finalising its budget. “In about a week so we will work your request into our thinking.”

Final approval for the lease-purchase agreement is expected by the middle of April, and SFCS hopes to be offering programming in the church by July 1.

Over 60 citizens present at a public meeting in Denbigh were united in their determination to keep their ambulance services in the Denbigh community.

On June 16, Denbigh resident Paul Isaacs led a public meeting at the Denbigh hall to inform the community at large about the IBI Group’s 2010 Ambulance Service Review Update, which was presented to county council at their June 8 meeting. The public meeting was brought about by Addington Highlands Reeve Henry Hogg, who, though he could not attend, felt strongly that the public should be informed of the issue.

Councilor Tony Fritsch expressed his strong belief in preserving the current service. “Denbigh is the logical location for an ambulance base to best serve in this region and it must be retained”.

AH Councilor Adam Snider then reviewed the IBI report, which recommends that “the northern services be consolidated to a single base along the 41 corridor in the Northbrook/Cloyne vicinity and one ambulance be relocated to Loyalist Township, where it can be put to more cost effective use.”

One reason given in the report for the proposed change is the presence of the Lakelands Family Health Team (LFHT), which now operates clinics in both Northbrook and Denbigh. At the meeting, a number of staff from LFHT made mention of the fact that at no time were they contacted by the IBI group prior to the completion of the 2010 report. Janice Powell, executive director of the LFHT, who also served on the 2008 Community Ambulance Committee, said she was surprised to find her team mentioned at all in the report. “We provide primary care service, not emergency services. We do not have the equipment, or the resources to be providing emergency care, and are open only during regular business hours. As far as I'm concerned the ambulance service has to stay, and I am prepared to come back on the committee to fight for it.”

Susan Peters, nurse practitioner at the LFHT, strongly reiterated that point. “Rural communities are under-serviced to begin with and a decrease in ambulance response times will mean that people will die. I do not have access to first line emergency drugs, nor IVs. The bottom line here is that the ambulance must stay.”

Dr. Tobia of the LFHT also spoke from the audience. “It's really quite simple. One life up here in the north is worth as much as one in the south. The biggest issue here is ambulance response time.” Dr. Tobia cited the projected response times resulting from consolidated service stats taken from the 2010 report, which state that with the new proposal, only 13% of Denbigh calls will be responded to within 15 minutes, a decrease from previous years, whereas in Odessa there will be an increase, to 97% of calls that will be responded to within 15 minutes. Dr. Tobia continued, “The notion of reducing response times is ridiculous, especially when all of the guidelines are proving that survival rates depend on people getting to the hospital sooner.”

Gary Foster, Hall 3 chief with the Kaladar/Barrie Fire Department, addressed the issue of the fire department’s need for ambulance services in the area to deal with serious injuries and medical calls. “We dread the fact that right now this area is less serviced by ambulances than any areas in Renfrew County. I can tell you right now that if service is reduced, the result will no doubt be more deaths.”

Paul Isaacs agreed. “This report does not take into account the types of calls that we get here. Out of the total calls, this service has a higher percentage of serious calls than those in Napanee, which means that while we may have fewer calls, they are of a more urgent nature.” Isaacs also brought up the issue of the shape of the service area as well as the widely spread population. “L&A County is extremely long and narrow, and the majority of the population lies within 30 miles of the lakeshore, which means that the service cannot operate the same way it does in other areas. This is a problem in bureaucracy, which seems to deem that all areas require the same kind of service, which is simply not the case.”

Councilor Fritsch addressed the 2010 report’s account of increased cost in the current service since 2008, which many present at the meeting believed was the result of the province’s discontinuation of volunteer service. “One thing that irks me was the 2008 report’s argument to omit volunteers due to the high cost of managing them. The idea to go to full-time paramedics rather than volunteers was supposed to reduce the administrative costs, but instead the costs have increased, not decreased,” he said.

Deputy Reeve Bill Cox weighed in on the overall costs. “This is not a cost saving proposal in any way. If you look at the report you'll see that cross border service is cheaper than supplying your own.”

Denbigh resident Yvonne Rosien, a former first response volunteer with the now defunct volunteer ambulance service, recalled getting paid $2 an hour as a volunteer and questioned why that service was discontinued. “I have watched a 50-year old woman die when an ambulance was standing by in Northbrook. I want to get other politicians involved and see them out here seeing how this issue is going to affect people in this community. It will affect every single one of us at one time or another.” Audience member Frances Rosenblath said she is alive as result of the ambulance services here. “Fifteen years ago I suffered an allergy attack and went into anaphylactic shock and if it wasn't for the ambulance service I wouldn't be here today.”

Members of the community planned to meet at a second meeting on June 21 in Denbigh, where a plan would be discussed on how to present their recommendations in a unified way to county council.

Affordable Housing post 2011

A presentation was made by Chris Laundry, a social housing consultant working for Lennox and Addington, about the future of the affordable housing sector in the county.

He provided an overview of the way provincial and federal governments have developed the current stock of rent geared to income and low-rent housing since the 1950s, and focussed on the most recent initiatives.

The main reason for his visit, however, was to talk about some of the implications of Bill 140, which was passed at Queen's Park in May. The major impacts of Bill 140 will come clear once some of the major provisions are enacted later this year.

“One of the major outcomes of the legislation will be to clarify the role of the consolidate service managers (CSM) and to streamline applications for affordable housing,” Laundry said.

Lennox and Addington County is a CSM and it operates about 350 housing units in Napanee and throughout the countryside, including some in Flinton.

Laundry said there will be changes that Lennox and Addington will have to deal with, and there may also be opportunities to add new kinds of housing as the result of the new legislation.

Denbigh Community Centre – Councilor Tony Fritsch presented a number of requests from the group working on bringing the Denbigh Community Centre project to completion. He divided the requests into items that need addressing now; items that need addressing in the near future; and “a list of additional projects for investigation.” Of immediate concern are the purchase and installation of a chimney liner ($2,800) and a minor roof repair ($1,500 or less). These were approved.

Northbrook fire hall and township office – Council established a committee that includes Reeve Henry Hogg, Deputy Reeve Bill Cox, Fire Chief Casey Cuddy, Public Works Manager Royce Rosenblath, and Clerk/Treasurer Jack Pauhl to consider a design/build project for a new combined fire hall and township office on a piece of land the township has purchased on Highway 41 south of Northbrook. A house located on the property is being demolished and the project is now ready to be looked at in more detail.

Roads – Royce Rosenblath reported that dust suppression is now being applied to gravel roads within the township. A tender was also awarded for gravel crushing to Genware for $86,000.

Fire – There were six bids received for a new tanker for the Denbigh station. The lowest was $179,739, below the $185,000 budgeted for the tanker. Council gave Fire Chief Cuddy the authority to award the tender, provided he is satisfied that the bidder has met all the requirements in the request for proposal that the township had set out. Cuddy also said he wanted to check with some other fire services to see if they have had a good experience with the company that provided the lowest bid, because they have not been a supplier to Addington Highlands in the past.

Denbigh Ambulance Network – Alice Madigan, the chair of the ambulance network, made a short presentation to Council, imploring council to “do everything in their power to help the community of Denbigh and surrounding neighbours retain the Denbigh ambulance base.”

“I want to point out that both the Denbigh and Northbrook ambulances were out on call the other night and a call came in from Skootamatta. It took over an hour for a response from Marmora. That's the kind of thing we are looking at if the Denbigh base closes. We are on your side,” said Reeve Hogg, who will preside of the debate at Lennox and Addington County Council on ambulance services in his role of County Warden.

by Jeff Green and Julie Druker

Smooth sailing for Frontenac Transportation Service at county – budget debate set for next week

Executive directors Don Amos of Northern Frontenac Community Services (NFCS) and David Townsend of Southern Frontenac Community Services (SFCS), along with Linda Rush, the co-ordinator of Frontenac Transportation Service, presented an outline of the amalgamated service.

The Frontenac Transportation Service combines the services of Rural Routes Transportation Service, which is run by NFCS and serves residents in North and Central Frontenac, and the transportation services by SFCS for South Frontenac residents, forming a single service for the entire mainland portion of Frontenac County. The county has been supporting both services for a number of years, all the while encouraging them to combine forces.

County Councilor, Central Frontenac Mayor Janet Gutowski, congratulated both agencies on their collaborative approach to what is a very valuable service.“This service is allowing people to stay in their homes and to get to appointments and is keeping them healthier. I am very pleased that the Local Health Integration Network (LHIN) is aware of what is happening and that they are seeing the value in this service as well.”

She said she would be supporting this year’s request for a $86,000 subsidy from the county.

County Councilor, North Frontenac Mayor Bud Clayton, wondered about collaboration with the Land O'Lakes Community Service. “Funding from the LHINs says you must be seamless with your transportation and there are folks from the north west part of North Frontenac that depend on the LOLCS for their transportation. Since you are asking this county for money, is there any way of getting some of it to LOLCS to help their rural transportation program?” he asked.

“We are not opposed to collaboration with LOLCS,” Linda Rush added. “There have been discussions with LOLCS and it is something that we have explored in the past.”

Warden Davison said, “This collaboration is something we asked for years ago and I commend both of you for your work.”

A funding request for Frontenac Transportation Services is included in the 2011 Frontenac County budget.Ompah joint firehall/ ambulance base plan grinds to a halt 

North Frontenac Mayor, County Councilor Bud Clayton expressed more than a little bit of frustration at Frontenac County Council last week as a debate over the proposed Ompah ambulance base/fire hall project dragged on.

“It is time to get the whole issue resolved and continue with the process to finally get the project built,” Clayton said.

But at the end of the day there was even less clarity over the issue. In response to a county staff report seeking direction from county council in order to proceed with a request for proposal for a project manager, the council ended up passing a motion asking staff for yet more information, thereby putting the entire project on hold once again.

Further complicating matters were the statements from a number of members of county council, which place in doubt the council's commitment to see the project come to fruition at the Ompah location.

The question that is confounding all involved at this point has to do with the size of the fire hall portion of the building and the corresponding amounts that the township and the county will pay for its construction

“At some point someone told someone that the fire hall itself would be 4000 square feet, but that is nowhere in any of our communications,” said Bud Clayton.

The revised total combined square footage of the two buildings that has been under consideration in recent weeks is for a 4,500 square foot building with a 3000 sq. foot section for the fire hall and 1500 sq. foot ambulance base.

Based on a protocol that has been agreed to on a senior staff level, the project is to be funded at a ratio of two thirds from North Frontenac Township and one third from Frontenac County.

It is this ratio that North Frontenac would like to see revisited, for two reasons. Firstly, they want some flexibility over the size of the fire hall in order to give themselves some flexibility over costs. Secondly, while estimates for ambulance base construction come in at $195 per square foot based on the cost of the recently constructed ambulance base in Sydenham, fire hall construction is less expensive, about $128 per square foot according to figures supplied by Paul Charbonneau, the Director of Emergency Services for Frontenac County.

North Frontenac would like the county to affirm their commitment for an upset limit of $300,000 towards the project, and has agreed to a county staff requirement that the project be completed using a project manager and a design-build construction contract following LEED environmental construction guidelines. The township would pay the rest of the cost.

“We might have to think of being flexible in our design to get the costs in line. We might have to reduce the size of the fire hall without affecting the ambulance base,” said North Frontenac County Councilor John Inglis.

But once the debate at county council was joined, it did not stick to the narrow issue of cost ratios. It quickly expanded to revisit the decision to build an ambulance base in Ompah in the first place, particularly because that decision also committed the county to replacing the existing Parham base with a new one in Sharbot Lake

Councilor Gutowski again aired her concerns about that move.

“I wonder, is there is a chance to revisit that issue?” she asked. “Not only was there no GIS mapping in 2008 when the analysis was done but in my mind I cannot separate the spending of $300,000 now and the extra $800,000 that is going to come as a result of this.”

When the decision was made in 2008, Paul Charbonneau said that the two options that he proposed would ultimately costing about the same amount of money because the cost of purchasing the Parham base, which the county now rents, and the county’s share of the Ompah project costs are about the same.

“All we want to do at this time is to get on with the project and build what county council has agreed to build in North Frontenac,” Bud Clayton reiterated in response to Janet Gutowski's comments. “The fire hall will likely go up at the cost of approximately $125-$130/square foot and the ambulance base at $200/per square foot and both buildings will be somewhat around the same size.”

Warden Gary Davidson said, “I'm a bit concerned with those numbers. If you think you can build for 60% of the cost of what we are building at, I wonder about the quality of that proposed building. Just what are we building here? A pig in a poke? I would like to see some drawings.”

Janet Gutowski wondered if these two buildings are not really better off being addressed as two separate projects.

“The sizes of the buildings have not yet been clarified so I am uncomfortable supporting a recommendation about the funding ratio because it seems premature. This whole process has been entirely too politicized. The highest criteria that we should be looking at, and one that this current proposal has never met regarding the location of the station, is response times. This is a matter of life and limb; putting a station in Ompah is going to leave a gap and require more financial wrestling to try to build a new station in Sharbot Lake. I am not prepared to support that at this time. We need more up to date statistics on mapping, location and response times,” Gutowski said.

Councilor John McDougall (South Frontenac) concurred. “My concern is that the community originally was not involved in these discussions. Moving the Parham ambulance base is a real concern. I feel right now there is a lack of clarity on the issues and I would agree that there needs to be more discussion.”

Councilor Clayton made once last effort to keep the proposed plan alive.

“What we're looking at here is a 2500 square foot fire hall and a 1500 square foot ambulance base, with the cost of building the base being higher that of the hall. All we are asking for right now is a different funding model. If doing so is going to cause all sorts of grief and force us to go back to the table then we are willing go ahead with the 2/3, 1/3 ratio that has been put forth.”

Paul Charbonneau said that changing the size of the building would definitely change the funding ratio as well as a number of other issues.

At the end of the day the staff report on the matter was received for information.

At this point no date has been set for setting out a request for proposal for the project.

The matter will undoubtedly be discussed at North Frontenac Council on Monday (March 28). 

Detailed roads study presents options, but council blocks them all

The world of municipal politics is sometimes akin to driving on a poorly maintained gravel road. Progress is slowed by bumps and potholes, and sometimes the road washes out altogether.

The drive for a regional road system to cover all of the major arterial roads in Frontenac County under one financial umbrella, which was initiated by county staff a couple of years ago, seems to be akin to a washed out road after a meeting of county council last week.

A detailed 150-page study of the road rehabilitation needs throughout the county, which was undertaken by Andrew Grunda, associate director of Watson & Associates, was presented to council at their meeting on Wednesday, March 16.

The Watson report included a preliminary analysis of the regional roads life-cycle capital needs and the fiscal implications associated with moving towards a sustainable funding for those assets and proposed numerous options to the county to address their road issues.

In a nutshell the final goal was to look at the long term sustainable funding levels for the various road networks as well as at different fiscal models available to the county to ensure service delivery over a 30-year period (2010-2040).

The report proposed three options for what are to be considered regional roads. The options range from a network including only the 382 kilometres, to a second option that includes arterial roads as well, which would include 454 kilometres of road, and a third that includes other major roads, for a total length of 519 kilometres of road.

Andrew Grunda summed up the report’s findings this way:

“At this stage in using a life-cycle based needs assessment, the county’s financial data is telling us that there is a significant amount of capital for a regional roads network that requires immediate attention - somewhere in the neighborhood of $37-$42 million. Overall, when we look at the fiscal impacts we see that having a county funding option does provide a more standardized source of funding and a broader funding pool for those regional roads assets. In most cases, with the exception of South Frontenac, the county funding scenario provides for a mitigated funding implication for those municipalities, which will tend to do better under a county approach as opposed to a status quo. That approach also provides a pool for the immediate needs required in South Frontenac.”

Essentially, as South Frontenac faces up to the cost of rehabilitating Road 38 in the near to immediate future, a regional system would enable those costs to be shared across the county, but in the longer term as roads elsewhere in the county need major work, the relative bulk of South Frontenac's population will become a source of revenue for smaller municipalities, and ratepayers in South Frontenac will end up subsidizing road costs throughout the county.

The Watson report concluded that further work on the plan needs to be done, including an engineered assessment of current road conditions and asset management practices, as well as the possibility of extra funding that the system might access, which is not flowing to the townships for road construction currently.

This could include provincial grants and/or allocations of county gas tax revenues and some of the savings the county has received through the provincial upload of social service costs.

“The benefit of having a regional system is to tackle the affordability concerns of some of the smaller municipalities in the county and maintaining a consistent, stable funding source at the county level,” Gunda concluded.

Warden Gary Davison, who is also the Mayor of South Frontenac Township, spoke out against the entire plan.

“All of this information you have gathered comes from our own various departments from information that we already have in our data bases,” he said, “We in South Frontenac have a five-year roads plan and have also looked 10 years down the road. I'm not in favour of where this study is taking us and I think we need to take charge of our own information. I believe we know what the local needs are and I think that our public works managers want to do this on a local level. Yes, we need to leverage the county for gas tax but we have spent a lot of money on ICSP programs that don't necessarily address what the crux of the gas tax money that was sent down from Toronto was to do, which was to maintain roads and bridges.”

Later in the meeting, a resolution was put forth to reconstitute a working group to consider how the Watson report can be implemented.

Deputy Warden Janet Gutowski supported the motion.

“Roads and infrastructure is a huge problem and for us to stick our heads in the sand is not appropriate. We need to come up with a plan and tackle this issue in a collaborative manner.”

A number of the new county councilors expressed the need to take more time to first review the report before acting further on the report.

In a recorded vote of 5-3, Warden Davison, councilors Doyle, McDougall, Jones and Purdon voted no, and Councilors Gutwoski, Clayton, and Inglis voted yes.

Photo: Kate Hamilton, SFCSC's new family coordinator

Kate Hamilton recently took over the position of family services coordinator at Southern Frontenac Community Services Corporation (SFCSC) at the Rural VISIONS Centre in Sydenham at the end of January and feels confident that her varied career puts her in good stead for the job that lies ahead.

“I feel very suited to the position since I have worked extensively with families in a number of different capacities throughout my career,” she said.

Kate studied Psychology and Women’s Studies at Trent University and graduated with honours from the Child and Youth Worker program at St. Lawrence College in Kingston in 2001. She has worked in group homes, child care centres, and also as a youth and program coordinator at the Katarokwi Native Friendship Centre in Kingston.She believes that her upbeat and friendly demeanor will be a definite plus in her new role at SFCSC. ”It often can be very difficult for families and individuals to ask for help and an important part of my job is to make them feel as comfortable as possible.”

Kate will be heading up five main areas of service to seniors, disabled adults and low-income families in the SFCSC's catchment area. Those services include various financial services, transportation, food services, referrals as well as client support and advocacy.

Executive Director of SFCSC David Townsend spoke of Kate’s suitability for the position of family services coordinator. “After reviewing 35 applications and holding interviews with six different applicants I know that we have chosen the right person for the job. Kate not only has the ability to truly understand a family in need but she also possesses the willingness to do her absolute best in finding ways to help them.”

The challenges for Kate are numerous, and high on her list is getting to know the SFCSC's catchment area. She well knows that she will also be struggling with limited funds, and cites for example “the increased demand of people wanting to stay in their homes compared to the availability of funds we have at our disposal to support them.” She also cites the rising cost of heating fuel as another big problem, along with sub-standard living conditions.

David Townsend is well aware of the challenges facing Kate and recalled how last year's out-going family services coordinator, Monica McWhirter, identified a total of 22 families and individuals in the catchment area who qualified as homeless. “Of those, nine were successfully housed. The others were either forced to couch surf and a few lived out of their vehicles. The situation out there is really that bad,” he said.

Right off the bat Kate will be re-implementing the Rural Women’s Group which starts running again on Wednesday, April 27 and will continue to run at the Harrowsmith Centre on the last Wednesday of every month.

For more information about any of the services available at SFCSC or to find out how you might volunteer, please call 613-379-6477, 1-800-763-9610 or visit www.sfcsc.ca