 | |  | |  | |  | |  | |  |
October 27, 2004
The Honourable Sandra Pupatello
Minister of Community and Social Services
Hepburn Block, Queen’s Park
6th Floor, 80 Grosvenor Street
Toronto, Ontario
M7A 1E9
Dear Minister,
Our family has recently been informed that many long term care facilities including Huronia Regional
Centre will be closed in the not too distant future.
My brother, Martin Hopper, is 43 years old and has been in the Huronia Regional Centre almost his entire
life. Huronia is his home; it is all he has ever known. To move him to a group home at this time could
almost be considered an inhumane and cruel act. Rather than just cast stones, I will attempt to explain
my opinion.
Most of the high functioning residents at the centre have already been relocated to group homes. The
residents that continue to reside at the Huronia Regional Centre are very low functioning. They require
a very high staff to client ratio. My brother can not talk and has very limited comprehension skills. He
probably has the mental capacity of a 4-5 year old who can not speak, yet finds himself in a grown man’s
body. He is only able to dress and feed himself. He requires help when going to the bathroom and
when bathing or shaving. He also has difficulty navigating stairs
The Huronia Regional Centre where he lives has been divided into wings containing several multiple
bedroom style apartments on each floor. The residents are free to wander between apartments and
down the hallways during regular daytime hours. Occasionally, residents will conflict and must be
separated into different wings so they won’t injure each other or the staff.. When an incident occurs, the
staff is able to react quickly because of the appropriate client/staff ratio on each shift. There are also
additional wings available on site which allow staff to reorganize problem clients quickly. In a group
home setting, I don’t believe the same level of protection would be afforded residents or staff. It is my
understanding that a large percentage of the time there is only one staff member available per shift in
many existing group homes.
A portion of Huronia Regional Centre grounds consists of a park like setting. The residents can take
supervised walks down to the small beach or in the park. Again, facilitating this freedom requires more
than one or two staff on the same shift. In a group home setting that would be nearly impossible.
Perhaps they would be released into the back yard which would certainly be fenced and very confined,
and likely unsupervised.
Huronia is a closed and protected environment. There are no throughways or streets through the area.
All of the people coming and going are very cognisant of the residents and drive in a manner that
protects the residents. Most of the residents do not realize that they are in harm’s way when they are on
the streets. Their safety is dependant on the awareness of the people driving on the property. Once
again, I doubt that they will receive the same courtesy in a regular neighbourhood with regular traffic.
At Huronia, the grounds could almost be considered a gated community. Staff and people at the center
are comfortable with the actions of the residents because they are trained professionals. They are
never alarmed by a resident who suddenly screams out loud or exhibits what would be considered
unusual behaviour in our so-called normal neighbourhoods. The real truth is that many occupants of
normal neighbourhoods would be quite frightened by the behaviours of severely mentally handicapped
individuals. I am certain that there would be a great deal of difficulty finding an area where these
residents would be accepted as they are in Huronia. I am sure that the minister herself would not be
comfortable with these residents living next door to her.
The budgets of Huronia are appropriate for the number of residents at the facility. It is my understanding
that in a group home setting the budgets, in particular the food budget, are often not enough to properly
care for the clients. Some of the staff at Huronia are former group home staff and have told stories of
inadequate budgets, including the food budgets. In one case, a group home had a van at their disposal
to transport the residents to different functions but they could not afford gas to operate it.
In most cases, the homes start out with sufficient funding but after a few years, the budgets are slowly
squeezed by inadequate inflationary increases until homes are operating at or below the bare minimum
levels. I would suggest that you rectify that problem before you put more people into the same situation.
Sometimes you simply can’t close a facility to save money and, in fact, those facilities are required. You
just have to put it into your annual budget and live with it as a necessary expense. Although I only know
Huronia, I will assume that the other two facilities fall into the same category. I believe that the land at
these facilities is already owned by the province so there are no savings there; in fact, it will be an
additional expense. It is my understanding that the money to be saved will be made up through lower
wages by hiring less qualified people to care for the residents. How can you possibly expect to receive
the same level of professional care by attracting less trained, less experienced people at a lower wage.
That is truly an impossibility
If you do decide to close these facilities and move the residents into a group home environment, I have
several questions and concerns about this plan of action. What standards are in place to ensure the
health, safety and well being of group home residents is maintained? Who will be responsible for
ensuring these standards are upheld? How do you propose to implement consistent, reliable, ongoing
reviews of these facilities to ensure that group home operators are providing a proper level of care for
these residents? These reviews should be carried out by an independent and/or government appointed
organization and the company or group operating the group home should not be allowed to self-monitor.
I think that all family members with clients in the home would expect to receive a copy of the report after
completion of a review, with an avenue to allow us to ask for deficiencies to be corrected.
In closing, I will say that my brother and his fellow residents need the Huronia Regional Centre. Lower
functioning residents simply require more care. There is nothing that will ever change that reality; so,
we all have to accept that fact along with the expense that is associated with it. You can not lump them
into the same category as higher functioning individuals.
Their quality of life will not improve in a group home situation. In fact, it will be drastically reduced.
These residents have many handicaps and very few freedoms in their lives. We have a responsibility as
compassionate human beings to provide them with protection and a decent quality of life, as we would
all expect if it was one of us. They can not speak for themselves so we, as their family members and
guardians, must strongly voice our objection to stealing the very minimal quality that they currently have.
If the minister took a few hours to visit the facility to see the low level of functioning that these residents
have, then visit an existing group home with higher functioning people, she would surely see that there
is nothing to be gained by moving these people into a group home situation. In fact, she would probably
be able to easily visualize the great difficulty a group home situation would present for these people.
On behalf of my brother, my two sisters and my mother, and all of the residents and their families, I would
ask for a change in the direction the government is currently pursuing in this matter and would ask for a
definite stop to the plan to close these facilities.
Thank you,
Tom Hopper
cc: Huronia Regional Centre staff