After a year under an Ontario-appointed supervisor, Peterborough’s Children’s Aid Society won’t say if its budget is balanced

The Kawartha-Haliburton Children’s Aid Society (KHCAS) won’t say whether it has balanced its budget, more than a year after the Doug Ford government put in place a supervisor to “reinstate good governance and fiscal sustainability” at the society.

Ontario Minister of Children, Community and Social Services Michael Parsa appointed Rosaleen Cutler to run KHCAS in October 2024, saying in a statement he did not “have confidence” in the society’s ability to address its “growing deficit and operational issues.”

KHCAS’ entire board of directors resigned in response.

Asked about the organization’s budget situation last week, KHCAS executive assistant Amy O’Connell told Peterborough Currents by email that “at this time, the Kawartha-Haliburton Children’s Aid Society will not be providing information as requested.”

Children’s aid societies are funded by taxpayers through grants from the provincial government. 

The province had insisted that KHCAS make deep spending cuts to stay within its funding allocation, prompting the board to put forward a three-year plan in 2024 to trim spending by $7.6 million, former vice chair Lynne Buehler told Currents. It included the elimination of 25 staff positions. But after Cutler’s abrupt appointment as supervisor last year, the province gave KHCAS a one-time cash injection of $7.5 million, nearly as much as the board planned to cut, according to the organization’s financial statements for the 2024/2025 fiscal year.

“I was glad that the deficit was wiped out, but we were told that money was not available and didn’t exist and it wasn’t possible to help us,” said Buehler, a retired police officer, in an interview. “So it was pretty disappointing when, shortly after the supervisor [was] installed, the entire debt was erased.”

The extra funding allowed KHCAS to end the 2024/2025 fiscal year with a budget surplus of $906,119. The organization, which serves Peterborough city and county, the City of Kawartha Lakes, and Haliburton County, was also able to avoid the planned closure of its Haliburton office, according to the news site The Highlander.

In an emailed statement, the Ministry of Children, Community, and Social Services described the $7.5 million as “emergency funding” meant “to continue supporting KHCAS as the society worked towards reinstating operational sustainability.”

But KHCAS is still grappling with financial challenges, according to Buehler. She said former board members had a meeting with Cutler in July, where they were told the organization faced a $1 million budget deficit for the 2025/2026 fiscal year.

Ruby Taylor, former president of OPSEU Local 334, which represents KHCAS staff, said the budget deficit is at least $1 million. Taylor, who had been a child protection worker at KHCAS for 13 years, left the organization in September after accepting a layoff, she said. She said hers was one of approximately 28 unionized positions that has been eliminated since last year.

Taylor said the government’s statements have given the impression that KHCAS’ leadership was “mismanaging money,” but the organization’s ongoing financial difficulties show that “simply wasn’t true.” 

“We believe that it was a lack of funding… that was the heart of the issue,” she said.

Buehler agreed. “[We’re] no farther ahead, not one iota ahead, from where we would have been had the ministry just worked with us and … helped us through a difficult period of time and identified the underfunding,” she said.

Asked about the budget, the ministry did not deny that KHCAS is still running a deficit.

“Under the direction of the Supervisor, a robust plan was submitted to the ministry, with measurable objectives and timelines,” the ministry’s statement said. “Substantial progress has been made on key objectives and agency governance was returned to a newly elected Board of Directors.” KHCAS announced it had put in place a new board last month, and said Cutler would continue to lead the organization while it looks for a permanent executive director.

The ministry’s statement reiterated that “the appointment of a supervisor at KHCAS was a necessary decision to address its growing deficit and operational issues to ensure the safety of children.” The province has provided no details about what those “operational issues” were.

Currents previously reported that base provincial funding for KHCAS trended downward between 2017 and 2024. During that period, the province stepped in multiple times to eliminate budget deficits at the society, providing $4.6 million in extra funding.

Under its previous leadership, KHCAS argued it needed higher funding because the cost of placing children in group homes and foster homes was rising and more children with complex needs were coming into care. The CAS is one of many across the province that has faced deficits in recent years amid increasing costs and a dire shortage of foster and group homes, which has led to some children being placed in unlicensed settings such as hotels and offices.

But the ministry has said that its spending on child protection has increased province-wide in recent years, even while the number of children in care has declined. 

The province announced a review of the child welfare system last year following reports about children’s aid societies placing children in unlicensed settings like hotels. The provincial ombudsman also said it would investigate the practice.