Billings council raises concerns with PHSD cuts
KAGAWONG—Billings township council has raised a concern regarding Public Health Sudbury and Districts (PHSD) reducing certain programs and services that fall outside its mandate and are the responsibility of other agencies, including beach inspections.
“The announcement from public health is clearly not good,” said Billings Councillor Ian Anderson at a December 17 council meeting. “I am very concerned they have cut down on the beach and waterfront monitoring and inspections. Our beaches have been closed several times over the years (after inspections have taken place). This is a loss we need to ask them (PHSD) about and make up somehow.”
“I agree,” stated Councillor Michael Hunt.
“Our beaches are something that will need to be dealt with,” said Mayor Bryan Barker.
As has been reported previously, beach monitoring and surveillance of water quality at beaches was cut by the board of health as part of this year’s budget.
Cynthia Rocca, manager of health and protection division with PHSD told The Expositor last Friday, “(PHSD) is no longer going to be conducting routine beach surveillance of public beaches or for class C recreational water facilities such as splash/spray pads or wading pools, beginning in 2025. Municipalities may choose to conduct surveillance and monitor them.”
The PHSD board of health had made these as part of cuts to its budget for this year due to funding limitations from the province and capacity issues, said Ms. Rocca. “The board had to assess where cuts could be made with limited resources and put these resources where it is most needed.” Although bathing beach inspections are valuable, the board decided this program and others being cut would not have a large impact on the public, she said.
The PHSD has in the past carried out bathing beach inspections to make sure they could be used by members of the public. As well, the health unit conducted regular beach monitoring sampling and inspections and would communicate to the public through media and by posting signs about beach closures or cautions the public should consider before using a beach.
“Municipalities will now be able to take this over should they wish to,” said Ms. Rocca. She said one of the difficulties in communicating concerns about a bathing beach is that, “we could do the inspections/monitor a beach on a Monday and get the lab results, but say by Wednesday the beach water condition results could have changed. The results were never really as true to the time the notification going out to people using the water. There has always been a long delay.”
This is one of several cuts to services which Medical Officer of Health Dr. Mustafa Hirji outlined in a meeting with Sudbury city councillors in early December. The end result is a budget increase of 3.2 percent to $31,036,499.
The Sudbury Star reported December 4, as has been noted previously, government funding has not kept pace with inflation. Dr. Hirji told the meeting, “We were able to bridge that with pandemic one-time funding, but we’re now at a point where we have to address that.”
The province is mandating public health organizations with “narrowing the scope of public health, reducing the service we deliver to better mirror the amount of funding we are receiving,” said Dr. Hirji.
“Following approval of its 2025 budget in an environment of constrained funding, (PHSD) is aligning its programs and services with its core mandate under the Ontario Public Health Standards. Public Health will focus its resources on areas that offer the greatest potential for healthy community outcomes, which includes health promotion as well as health protection efforts,” Dr. Hirji explained to Billings council in a letter.
“As part of this work, Public Health is responsibly reducing or discontinuing certain programs and services that fall outside its mandate and are the responsibility of other agencies, or where the impact on community health is small, to ensure Public Health’s resources are focused where they can achieve the greatest impacts on community health. Public Health is notifying you of changes that will affect municipalities and is offering support, where possible.”
“The following is a summary of changes to public health programs and services beginning in 2025 that will impact your municipality,” continued Dr. Hirji. “Public Health is no longer responding to health hazard investigations that are not part of the public health mandate. This includes, but is not limited to, housing, rodent, insect, garbage and complaints related to lack of heat. Residents will be advised to contact their municipalities for assistance under existing municipal bylaw, and with any questions they may have.”
“Public health is no longer conducting routine beach surveillance of all public beaches to monitor the safety of public bathing areas and beachfront areas for hazards. Water testing of bathing beaches will cease, including support required for the Blue Flag program,” wrote Dr. Hirji. “Public notification of bathing beach safety or the status of swimming advisories through Public Health’s Check Before You Go! Website will also cease. Day camp bathing beaches will also no longer be tested for municipalities. Public Health will no longer respond to potential sightings of blue-green algae. That means our agency will no longer conduct site assessments or collect samples of potential blooms. Municipalities should report potential blue-green algae blooms to the Ministry of the Environment, Conservation and Parks. Public Health will continue inspections of recreational camps, as required.”
For splash pads (class C recreational water facilities), “Public Health is no longer conducting annual routine inspections of splash/spray pads. Please remove any Check Before You Go! disclosure signage from these locations as the information will no longer be posted to our disclosure website. Public Health will continue to address complaints as they are reported,” continued Dr. Hirji.
Other cuts to PHSD services include: the Growing Family Health Clinic, Tuberculosis skin testing for non-public health purposes, fee-for-service vaccination, in-person food handler training, re-communication of food safety recalls, unless explicitly requested by the provincial government or the Canadian Food Inspection Agency. PHSD will no longer provide health hazard investigations that are not part of the Public Health mandate, such as housing complaints related to lack of heat, bedbugs, and rodents or pests, vision screening for senior kindergarten students, classroom education by public health inspectors, and vector-borne disease surveillance activities, such as mosquito trapping for West Nile virus detection and tick collection for Lyme disease detection.
Public Health is also updating fees for septic system applications to bring them to a cost-neutral state, since Dr. Hirji said the rates were last adjusted in 2018.
The beach water quality inspections were done at 34 public beaches in Greater Sudbury, Chapleau, Espanola, Massey, Gogama, Killarney and Manitoulin Island. When high levels of bacteria or other unsafe conditions were noted, Public Health would post warning signs and a public notice would be issued.
Ms. Rocca added, “we would encourage municipalities to come up with an education strategy for bathers at a beach to know what to look for and report any concerns, as well as a surveillance program to outline when the water can be used and precautions to take.”
