'We are going backwards' on addiction support: Mayor Provenzano

As other Northern Ontario communities are adding mental health and addiction services like supervised consumption sites, Sault Ste. Marie’s mayor says the supports in this city are moving backwards.

Last month, Mayor Christian Provenzano penned a letter to Ontario Health pleading for provincial funding for Sault Area Hospital’s Concurrent Disorders lntensive Day Treatment Programming.

Sault Area Hospital informed community partners on June 23 that the pilot project would be paused due to lack of funding. In less than two years, the program treated more than 110 individuals, with about 40 per cent of graduates returning to work, school or finding new employment.

"The program provided badly needed specialized mental health and addictions care for those with complex addictions and mental health needs," Provenzano wrote in his letter to Ontario Health. "We need to offer more services – not less – and I urge Ontario Health to provide Sault Area Hospital with the annual funding it needs to restore the program."

In a recent interview, Provenzano told SooToday that the mental health and addiction crisis in the Sault knows no boundaries.

“You see it. It’s more visible now than it’s ever been,” said Provenzano. “It touches many families independent of socio-economic standing, recognizing it touches some people more significantly than others, but it is very pervasive and I hear from parents who are struggling with concern and worry about their child, I hear from friends who have lost friends, I hear from people themselves who are struggling and having a hard time.”

Algoma Public Health says the opioid-related death rate in Algoma was 2.7 times higher than the rest of Ontario in 2020.

While the issue of mental health and addiction worsens in the Sault, the Concurrent Disorders lntensive Day Treatment Programming is being eliminated altogether.

“We are going backwards and we are going backwards at a time when there is greater need, when people are having greater challenges and we are not receiving the support we need to be receiving,” said Provenzano.

Provenzano said a similar pilot project was funded in North Bay, but not in Sault Ste. Marie.

“They aren’t able to fund it anymore and the provincial government won’t fund it, so we don’t have funding to continue it,” he said.

Meanwhile, North Bay, Timmins and Sudbury have either opened supervised consumption sites in their respective cities or will be doing so in the near future.

In those communities, initial funding is either being assumed by the municipality or the social services administration board, not from the province.

“It’s a bit of a concern to see municipalities or even social service administration boards funding health care because they are funding it with the hope that the funding will be assumed by the other orders of government, but that’s not the way things often happen,” said Provenzano.

He added: "It’s a bit bewildering to have such little response from the government on what is evidently the most significant crisis facing the province. It’s frustrating, it’s confusing because it’s unclear to me and a number of my colleagues why the response has been so insubstantial and inadequate."

He likened the situation to other instances in which the Ontario government has forced municipalities to assume the costs of services like paramedics or court security, which were previously funded by the province.

“To me it’s another download, but it’s a healthcare download,” said Provenzano. “We have a hard time covering all of the downloads we currently have to cover. To cover healthcare is just too onerous for a municipal tax base.”

Having said that, Provenzano is in favour of a supervised consumption site opening in Sault Ste. Marie and says he has invited Willow Addiction Support Services to speak at city council about a potential application.

“I have always been very explicit that I support supervised consumption sites and I have always said to the people within city hall and to the people who were championing it that I would support it,” said Provenzano. “Where they are at with it, I think they are kind of stuck between the federal and provincial governments right now.”