Social assistance health benefits at risk as Councillor Parnell appears ready to change vote

This is a corrected story. A previous version of the article incorrectly stated that vision care, dental care, and other health benefits are discretionary for ODSP recipients. In fact, those health benefits are only discretionary for OW recipients. For ODSP recipients they are mandatory.

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Debate over whether Peterborough should continue funding health benefits for people on social assistance next year seemed to be settled last Tuesday, when councillors voted 6-5 to maintain the funding.

But that decision may be reversed, after a councillor who voted in favour of funding the benefits indicated she wants to change one of her votes, which she’ll have a chance to do when Peterborough’s draft 2025 budget comes before council for final approval.

The benefits in question are called discretionary benefits. For people receiving Ontario Works, discretionary benefits cover expenses such as vision and dental care, dentures, and hearing aids. 

For people enrolled in the Ontario Disability Support Program (ODSP), the situation is a little different. Health-related benefits are mandatory, which means the proposed budget cut won’t impact those benefits for ODSP recipients. However, certain expenses such as funeral and burial costs and bus pass subsidies are delivered as discretionary benefits for ODSP recipients, according to social services director Rebecca Morgan-Quin.

City staff had recommended eliminating the city’s funding for the benefits in the 2025 draft budget as a cost-saving measure. Council’s vote last Tuesday was for the funding to be restored.

However, a few hours after the vote and in the final minutes of the budget meeting, Coun. Lesley Parnell requested to retroactively change one of her votes in an exchange with Coun. Andrew Beamer, who chaired the meeting. 

Parnell was off-mic. But Beamer’s comments, which were mic’d, established that Parnell was referring to a 6-5 vote. Beamer described the vote as “discre—” before cutting himself off. Another councillor later confirmed to Currents that the discretionary benefits vote was the one Parnell requested to change. Beamer said it was too late to change Parnell’s vote, but he advised her that she could change it when the issue came up again at a city council meeting in December.

Parnell did not respond to several requests for comment from Currents.

Most of the funding for discretionary benefits comes from the provincial government. But the province caps the amount it provides for the benefits at an average of $10 per case per month, which in Peterborough works out to an annual funding limit of about $1.2 million. If case workers in Peterborough approve any discretionary benefits beyond that amount, the city has to foot the bill.

In 2024, the city approved about $1.5 million of discretionary benefit spending and the municipal share of that expense was $270,895, according to the draft budget.

Peterborough’s community services commissioner Sheldon Laidman explained that the provincial portion of discretionary benefit funding will remain available even if the municipal funding is cut. But without the city’s contribution, funds may run out part way through the year or the city might have to “limit discretionary benefits by policy” to ensure the provincial funds are sufficient.

“We have been spending a lot of our discretionary benefits,” said director of social services Rebecca Morgan-Quin during budget talks last week. “We don’t look forward to the idea of having to try to curb it part way through the year or reduce the number of people that we can assist.”

Kirsten Armbrust, the executive director of the Community Counselling and Resource Centre (CCRC), said that many of the discretionary benefits “are things that should be mandatory.”

“Those are things that people need for their health,” Armbrust said.

Province capped its funding for discretionary benefits in 2012, leaving cities to pick up the tab

There is a history of reducing discretionary benefits to balance budgets in Peterborough. 

The benefits used to be entirely paid for by the province. But on July 1, 2012, the Ontario government capped its funding, slashing $20 million from the provincial budget, and the City of Peterborough stepped in to foot some of the bill. 

Since then, provincial funding for the benefits has remained relatively steady while the city’s funding has decreased. In 2019, the city contributed $749,263 to bring the program’s total budget to $1.79 million. By 2024, the city’s portion had dropped to $270,895. 

Now, the funding might be eliminated entirely as city councillors look for ways to reduce next year’s property tax increase, which is currently sitting at 8 percent. Eliminating municipal funding for discretionary benefits would bring that increase down to 7.9 percent and save the median property owner about $6.18 on their tax bill next year.

Meanwhile, the number of people accessing Ontario Works is increasing. In 2023, the average caseload was 3,030 people. In 2025, the city is budgeting for a caseload of 3,451 people because “numbers are forecasted to increase across the province.”

Community Living Trent Highlands executive director Teresa Jordan explained one mindset behind the repeated cutbacks to the benefits. “In the general public’s eye there’s this idea that the government can make cuts and be fiscally responsible, and some imaginary charity agencies like mine will just fill in the gap,” she said.

However, Jordan noted the reality is that “cuts to these kinds of things mean that people who are already almost impossibly making ends meet suddenly will have to go without.”

“I’m often amazed at how just a little bit of extra money or extra support or extra coverage for expenses can keep someone out of crisis,” Jordan said. “Conversely, death by a thousand small cuts can cause a spiral that will destabilize and put a person into crisis.”

During budget deliberations, Coun. Kevin Duguay said that it was “incredibly unfair” that the working poor, who likely need health benefits as badly as people on social assistance, aren’t eligible for discretionary benefits. Duguay voted against funding the benefits.

Emily Bennett, who lives in downtown Peterborough, depends on ODSP to help pay her bills. The mandatory health benefits she receives through ODSP helped pay for an eye exam and new frames for her glasses in 2022.

“I don’t make enough money on my own from my part-time job and ODSP to save anything, so if I were paying out of my own pocket, I’d have just kept my outdated prescription forever,” Bennett said.

Bennett said the city should be making it easier for people who need them to access social assistance benefits, not cutting funding for them. She said that navigating the system to access benefits is challenging, and she finds it difficult to understand which expenses are eligible for coverage. 

“The concept of discretionary benefits was never explained to me in a way that I was able to understand and remember,” she said. “Those of us with learning impairments don’t even understand we have some of these funds available to us to begin with.” 

Although some social assistance recipients may be unaware that these benefits exist or that they might be reduced, some citizens pleaded with councilors to keep the funding in the budget during council’s general committee meeting on November 12.

“People are suffering. They’re going without. They’re struggling,” said retired occupational therapist Joanne Bazak-Brokking during a delegation to council. “It’s just really devastating to think that another cut is going to occur to this particular budget line when it’s needed more than ever.”