City-County dispute over Fairmount Home and land ambulance funding headed to mediation/arbitration.

Jeff Green | Sep 06, 2019

A disagreement that has been simmering for months between the City of Kingston and the County of Frontenac was discussed at a meeting of Kingston City Council on Tuesday evening (September 3)

Both services are operated by Frontenac County with funding from the Province of Ontario, as well as ratepayers from Frontenac County and City of Kingston through property taxes. Under the terms of an agreement that has not been amended for 15 years, the City of Kingston pays an annual levy for the delivery of the services.

The formula for the levy to the City for land ambulance is based on cumulative property values in both the City and the County, and the break down for Fairmount Home is a fixed percentage, with City ratepayers paying 68% of municipal costs and Frontenac County ratepayers paying 32%.

Back in January county staff presented their estimate for the amount of money they were expecting to levy from the City for their share of the costs of delivering land ambulance and operating the Fairmount Home long term care facility.

The estimated cost increase for the services amounted to an increase of 14.4% for Fairmount Home and 8.7% for Frontenac Paramedic Services (land ambulance). City Council had set a target of 2.5% for its budget increase for the 2019 and passed that expectation on to outside agencies that it provides funding.

This is where City and County officials have different recollections.

According to Frontenac County staff, they requested time to present a detailed case to Kingston City Council to accompany the funding requests but time was not allocated for them. The budget request went Council with minimal explanation, even though, at least in the case of the paramedic services budget, much of the increase was tied to a year over year increase in emergency calls from the City of Kingston.

City officials point out that their council did not agree to the County request back at the time. They proceeded to complete their own budget based on the expectation of a much smaller increase than had been presented to them, with the expectation that Frontenac County would cut the budget down after the City had not accepted it as submitted. The City budget did include a 5% increase for the services, and City staff allocated an extra $150,000 into a reserve fund in case the county came in with an even higher levy.

County staff then presented their budget request to Frontenac County Council, and the larger increases were eventually were included in the Frontenac County budget. When the City got the bill, they got case of sticker shock. They suddenly had a budget shortfall in the range of $450,000. Even with the $150,000 reserve fund, there is still a $300,000 discrepancy.

This led Mayor Paterson, as he outlined to his council on Tuesday night, to enter into a dialogue with Frontenac County Warden Ron Higgins about the miscommunication that led to a financial dispute between neighbours.

As Ron Higgins told the Frontenac News this spring, even though he has served on Frontenac County Council for over 4 years and was into his second year as warden, he did not understand what the Rural Urban Liaison Committee (RULAC) was all about. RULAC had been set up 20 years ago to make sure members of Kingston and Frontenac County Council were able to discuss service and financial matters between them. RULAC meetings were held regularly in the early years of the relationshipbut over the past 8 years, meetings were continually canceled, usually at the request of the City, on the grounds that there was nothing to discuss. Finally, by mutual agreement, RULAC meetings were not scheduled at all, and it was left to the discretion of one of the partners to request a meeting.

Higgins and Paterson decided a RULAC meeting would be beneficial. But the meeting, which was held on June 26, seems to have led to more miscommunication between the two parties. Mayor Paterson, two council members and City staff came to the meeting with what they considered a fair offer. This City would cover $100,000 as long as the County agreed to cover the other $200,000.

“I was surprised, and I must say disappointed as well, that after that meeting the County did not even consider the proposal at their next Council meeting,” Paterson said on Tuesday night. The motion that came forward to the July meeting of Frontenac County Council was not seconded and did not even make it onto the table for debate.

“It’s not as if the talked about it and decided not to support it, they never even debated it at all,” Paterson told City Council. “Now the ball was in our court.”, in my view oirtins 2 was some comporinsem this is restating our desire for compromise. We enve talks bout both sies putting reserves on the table I;m hopeful this is acutally extending a had to the county

City staff prepared a short report on the matter, with three options. Option 1 is for the City to pay the county $300,000 less than had been levied, option 2 is for the City to pay $200,000 less, and option 3 would see the City pay the entire levy. Option 2 was put on the table first and it was supported by all but one of the 13 member council.

“I feel that it is a reasonable compromise, even though it will lead to arbitration,” said one of the councillors.

“In my view ,option 2 goes some way in restating our desire for compromise,” said Mayor Paterson

The City’s in-house legal department will handle the case as it heads to mediation and, likely as not, arbitration.

When asked by a member of council what it will cost for the legal department to work on the case, since there is only $200,000 to be gained or lost, the solicitor said “they will do it on their lunch hours and on weekends”, adding that the cost of mediation itself is not that high, somewhere around $10,000.

Before City Council met on Tuesday night, Frontenac County CAO sent them a letter outlining the rationale for the increased levy.

He explained the increase in costs for paramedic services.

The increases in paramedic services cost are directly related to increased pressures on the system in the City of Kingston, primarily in the west end of the City. The volume increase of paramedic calls in the City of Kingston between 2013 and 2018 was 2,622, which is 13 percent. To deal with those pressures, the County has been adding resources back.

“In 2018, Frontenac Paramedics responded to 23,158 calls. The City is responsible for 78.97 percent of the 2019 Frontenac Paramedics budget, however 87 percent of all paramedic calls are within the City of Kingston. To agree with the City’s suggestion that the County pay for half of the City’s increase would mean that County residents are further subsidizing the cost of the service within the City by paying for the increased service demand in the City of Kingston.”

Pender also addressed the increase in Fairmount Home costs.

“After the province implemented an aging at home strategy, residents are entering long-term care homes at a later stage in their lives with more acute and chronic conditions. With the support of County Council, Fairmount Home has been moving towards a minimum four hours of care per resident per day, with a seven-year strategy in place to achieve that goal by 2024. This includes adding direct care staff.”

When asked, City of Kingston treasurer Desiree Kennedy said that the four hours of care per resident per day minimum is “not a legislated standard, but a voluntary commitment made by Fairmount management and endorsed by Frontenac County.”

There are also services that are delivered to Frontenac County residents by the City of Kingston for which the County of Frontenac pays annual levies to the City of Kingston.

At their meeting in July, Frontenac County Council reiterated their position that the City of Kingston has no option but to pay the levy that was forwarded to them back in March, after the County budget was passed.