Staff
The Rainy River District Social Services Administration Board passed its 2013 budget yesterday, bringing with it a decrease of 1.02 percent in costs to the municipalities.
“The board, staff, and management at the DSSAB have worked very hard over the past year to hold costs and return funds to the municipalities through a reduction in the 2013 levy,” CAO Dan McCormick noted in a press release this morning.
“It is a difficult time in the Rainy River District with many changes, both negative and positive, affecting our municipalities,” said DSSAB chair Ross Donaldson.
“This budget reflects an achievable budget that maintains services across our district while striving for further efficiencies in the future,” he added.
Approved components of the $18.8-million budget include:
•Ontario Works—$2.75 million;
•Children’s Services—$3.49 million;
•Emergency Medical Services—$6.61 million;
•Social housing—$5.38 million; and
•Central administration—$530,000.
Despite the decrease in costs to the municipalities, the $18.8-million budget actually reflects an increase of about $2 million above the 2012 budget, McCormick said.
The increased budget amount primarily is due to $1.3 million in additional funding for children’s services, which now is covered 100 percent by the province.
This new funding and savings in children’s services in 2012 resulted in 23.1 percent in decreased costs to the municipalities for this program.
Additionally, a reclassification of DSSAB housing costs from the prior year resulted in a higher budget figure, but does not reflect an increase in program costs or cost to the municipalities.
Social housing saw an increase in overall program costs of $417,000, which is directly related to the addition of the 100-percent provincially-funded Community Homelessness Prevention Initiative (CHPI).
Factoring in unexpended funds from 2012, the cost to municipalities for the social housing program has dropped by 0.7 percent.
Ontario Works, meanwhile, realized a slight increase due to the loss of provincial transition funding.
However, a reduction in expenditures limits the effect to the municipalities to 1.9 percent.
Land ambulance increased slightly (2.3 percent) from 2012 with the inclusion of costs associated with increased coverage for the Rainy River Health Centre.
