The ongoing saga of a battle for 'fairness' in a funding formula has taken its next step toward a conclusion.
The City of Timmins has opted to resume its payments to the Cochrane District Social Services Board, although they are doing it "under protest."
A very brief Special Meeting was held at noon on Wednesday. The agenda consisted of a lone resolution seeking council approval to resume payments. It was passed unanimously, although Councillors Veronica Farrell and Rick Dubeau were not present.
"It means we don't agree with the current funding formula, or what the province did in relation to freezing it. Council has given previous direction to get legal advice on that matter. But at the same time, we feel it's the right move to continue payments to the DSSAB and allow it to function while we resolve those matters," said Mayor Steve Black after the meeting.
Current CDSSAB CAO Brian Marks called Black to confirm which direction the resolution was headed.
"He called to seek clarification if this was us passing a resolution to continue to withhold payments, or whether we were resuming payments, so that was clarified to him."
Black said despite the seemingly endless turmoil on the issue over the past three years, Timmins has not missed any payments, despite threatening to do so on a few occasions.
"After speaking with our legal team, it was felt this was the best move for Timmins."
DSSABs oversee emergency services, ambulance, Ontario Works, social housing, and child welfare services. Black has long lobbied that Timmins is paying an unfair amount for what it receives back, which has caused plenty of conflict and strong words throughout the region over the past few years. As the largest centre, Timmins pays the most into the DSSAB. Other communities have said Timmins receives business from their communities, and should expect to carry a little extra weight for the betterment of the region.
After much deliberation, a new formula was approved in March, which would have every municipality in the region save money, except for the "medium sized" centres of Kapuskasing, Cochrane, and Hearst. Everything was set to take affect on Jan. 1, until the province stepped in and blocked the new formula in December.
Black made it clear he was 'disgusted' with the decision, and on Wednesday he said there has been no dialogue with the province since the letter was received.
"We wrote a letter to the government, following the last resolution that was passed, putting payments on hold and seeking legal advice, or asking for some relief from the CDSSAB. We have not been responded to in terms of that correspondence. I believe our CAO has also reached out to the ministry on a couple of occasions in follow up to that. We also requested a meeting at ROMA (Rural Ontario Municipal Association) and to my knowledge we don't have a meeting scheduled yet. So we will wait and see what the province's response is. I'd imagine given that we said we were going for legal advice, their legal advice might be 'wait and see' as well," said Black.
