After a very consequential October meeting of the Joint Social Services and Land Ambulance Committee don’t expect things to get anymore chill for November in spite of the cool weather. At this meeting, look for a full scale update about Paramedic Services (or Land Ambulance depending on where you stand in Wellington County), and, in keeping with the season, we will also visit some budget matters.
NOTE: This meeting takes place at 1 pm in the Guthrie Room at the Wellington County Administration Building on Woolwich Street.
65 Delhi St. Transitional Housing Construction Project: Status Report 9 – With completion still expected next month, there’s actually still a lot of stuff left for the contractors to do including the painting, the tiling, installation of the elevator, installation of the door and security systems and some stuff on the grounds like curb and sidewalk installation.
Request For Proposal Award for Solar Photovoltaic Systems – The County recently sent out a request for proposals, or RFP, to design and install solar power systems on three buildings in Guelph. Based on their evaluation criteria, County staff have opted to give the tender to VCT Group out of Kitchener, who will fulfil the project based on a budget of almost $579,000 plus HST.
Tender Award: Heat Pump Installation at 130 Grange Street – The County is seeking a vendor to install electric heat pumps at one of their housing developments here in Guelph. Out of nine bids, the winning tender is Airwave Heating and Cooling from Guelph for almost $632,900 plus the HST.
Financial Statements as of October 31, 2024 – There was no formal report with this agenda, but the statements show that the budget for Ontario Works and childcare is still fairly on track for the year, while Social Services is running over budget in a couple of different areas including finances, insurance, supplies and equipment.
Ontario Works 2025 User Fees and Charges – The Ontario Works office offers a number of services including photocopying and faxing, but the only change to the charges for the 2025 is interpreter services for external organizations.
2025-2034 Preliminary 10-Year Plan: Social Services – It’s budget time everywhere it seems, so we’re going to get into these preliminary numbers from the County. There will be some big changes next year in operating, a lot of it being driven by the acquisition of a new property (see below), and the addition of the temporary accommodation at the old Norfolk Manor along with the winter response plan. As for capital, there’s life cycle replacement and the usual maintenance. The report also outlines spending on Ontario Works and childcare, but most of what’s in those budgets are recouped from other levels of government.
Agenda Forecast: Projected Land Ambulance Reports – As requested by the committee last month, City of Guelph staff are providing a schedule of when reports about the activities of Paramedic Services will come back to the JSSLAC and what those reports are expected to be.
Update to the Optimal Resource Deployment of Paramedic Services Study – Paramedic Services has recently completed new modelling about potential increased demand on the service thanks to Operational Research in Health Limited. What do we know? Emergency calls are expected to increase by 52 per cent over he next decade, the service will have to expand just to maintain current levels of service, the reallocation of some stations could impact response times, and most of the current stations in the county don’t have the additional resources needed to expand capacity.
The next phase will see Guelph staff start coming up with a plan to implement the recommendations, including the facility expansions through much of the County, which will likely start with Arthur given that the land for it is secured, but it will also have to include Erin and Guelph/Eramosa because the service expansions there starting in 2028 need bigger facilities to accommodate them.
2025 Land Ambulance Budget Update Report – Despite the Strong Mayor directive to get the budget to a four per cent maximum increase, there’s been little-to-no impact on Paramedic Services. Any budget increase in this area is mostly in the service of inflation and service expansion, plus there has been an extra $500,000 built into the 2025 budget as a contingency for the potential impact from the closure of the Consumption and Treatment Site in the spring.
Transfer of 440 King Street, Mount Forest, to County of Wellington – As you may know, the Mount Forest Non-Profit Housing Corporation is transferring ownership of this project to the County. There are just a couple of motions that the committee has to approve in order to complete the transfer, including a direction to the warden and the clerk to execute the Agreement of Purchase, which will go into effect on January 2.
Wellington Home Child Care Recruitment Campaign – This summer, the County ran a promotional campaign to recruit more license home child care providers to assist with the supply of childcare spots in the region. Thanks to ads on radio, social media, posters and other outreach, there were about four times as many inquires in 2024 as there were in the same time last year, and as a result there are 18 new providers who will be adding as many as 108 new spots to the system.
Correspondence from Ontario’s Big City Mayors: October 18, 2024 – Included in the agenda is a copy of the motion passed by Ontario’s Big City Mayors at their recent meeting, but it’s not the letter signed by about half the members asking Ontario’s Premier to use the notwithstanding clause of the constitution.
Guelph Politico 