GUELPH POLITICAST #444 – The Ongoing Struggle at Community Living (feat. Cindy Kinnon)

Community Living Guelph Wellington has been around since 1955 providing support and services to people with intellectual and developmental disabilities, and their families in the communities in which they live, and for the last few years they’ve faced some serious financial issues. 2024 is no exception, but might the important services of Community Living get lost in the shuffle of all the crushing need out there.

This is from an article in the Wellington Advertiser last week: “Community Living Guelph Wellington is facing a $3 million deficit in 2025 and will be closing two of its residential sites to rein in expenses.” That sounds pretty bad, but it sounds even worse when you realize that this is a dance that’s happened every fall for the last few years, and that doesn’t do a lot for the long-term sustainability of the organization.

Another detail from the Advertiser article is that Community Living’s funding has only increased four per cent in the last 30 years. If you think about issues around Ontario funding for autism programs, or the severe underfunding of payouts for everyone receiving money under the Ontario Disability Support Program, or ODSP, it’s pretty clear that there’s a crisis when it comes to supporting people with special needs in this province.

This week, we’re going to shed some light on what might be the most overlooked demographic in the area of people in need, and how we can all do better on their behalf. So we're joined by Cindy Kinnon, the executive director of Community Living Guelph Wellington, who will talk about how long they’ve been managing with a budget shortfall, and how they’ve managed to get across the fiscal finish line in the last few years, and how every one in Guelph can help them out.

So let's go inside Community Living on this week's Guelph Politicast!

You can learn more about Community Living Guelph Wellington at their website, you can follow them @clguelphwell on Facebook and Instagram, or you can get in touch with them the old fashioned way on the phone at 519-824-2480. If you’re interested in signing the petition to help support Community Living, send an email to Pam Howard at howard.march [at] outlook.com.

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