By Matt Graveline
City Hall Bureau
A provincial bill has the City of Ottawa worried about the future funding of long-term care homes in the city.
Long-term care homes are an addition to Ontario hospitals. When someone injures themselves or requires long term supervision, hospitals pass these patients on to homes that have long-term-care facilities. By extension these homes are funded by the provincial government, which is responsible for health care.
The province didn’t believe that there were enough regulations to govern these homes properly, says Elizabeth Ward, vice-chair of the city’s seniors’ advisory committee. So, the government tabled a bill in October to deal with what they called inconsistencies in administrating long term care.
The Long-Term Care Homes Act, is a bill that proposes to regulate everything from staff supervision to proper restrains in all long-term care homes in Ontario.
The problem lies in the funding required for the new bill’s standards. More new regulations will require more manpower, says Marlynne Ferguson, acting director of the city’s long-term branch.
But the province hasn’t delivered appropriate funding for some time now, says Ward.
In 2004, the provincial government committed to give $6,000 per long-term care resident each year.
As of 2007, she says the province has only delivered $2,000 per resident per year.
“Should Bill 140 become law it will be exceedingly difficult to deliver patient care if adequate funding is not forthcoming,” she says. “They have left out $2.2 million in provincial funding.”
Ward says she is preparing recommendations about how the city should respond to the bill. She says she hopes her committee will pass it on to corporate services in March.
But city council has already begun to address the bill’s potential.
On Jan. 24, council voted on the city’s position on the provincial bill which will now be communicated to the province’s minister of health and long-term care.
It came up with two funding concerns that Ferguson says are relevant.
The first is the new standards the bill imposes will not be accompanied by sufficient operating funds from the province.
Council is concerned about sufficient provincial funding because the city has four not-for-profit long-term-care homes it has co-funded for years, says Ferguson.
“The concern of the city is that the proposed Bill 140 implies a greater amount of time that staff is needed. So they want to make sure that the province also increases the funding,” she says.
The province has not indicated whether it will increase its funding as of yet.
But Somerset Coun. Diane Holmes says the city position on the bill is not to simply reflect a need for funding, but rather a frustration with the province.
“The province is in the habit of downloading responsibility,” she says.
“Social housing, health and now this, it is an enormous administrative burden. They are downloading without funding.”
One of the proposed new standards involves restraining dementia patients. Ferguson says these patients are labeled as “exit seeking” and the proposed regulation would call for far more staff supervision.
Right now, the city provides a lot of funding for the homes, even though long-term homes are a provincial health concern. She says the city allocates $8.9 million to their long-term homes each year.
Holmes says with all the standards in the bill, the city might have to hire more people and pay them with city funds for provincial work.
She says the council is looking to the province to either take the city homes, which are already under rigorous independent inspection, off the list of homes affected by the bill or for the province to take responsibility for funding.
“We would like to see them state that their standards will come with adequate funding to take care of the added workload.”