Its been some time since I wrote anything about 'rural affairs'
and government support, or lack thereoff, of our rural communities
having be far more focused upon the road our federal government has
been leading our counter which seems to be right over the cliff! See
my other blog
Democracy
Under Fire for my views on the most recent
antidemocratic move by the Harperites called the “Fair” Elections
Act!
Anyway the Ontario Ministry of Rural Affairs recently held the
first-ever Rural Ontario Summit
in partnership with the Rural Ontario Institute
and just released a
“Rural
Roadmap” document based upon their
discussions. Whilst having this discussion was a very good first step
in reengaging with rural communities and identifying areas of concern
and possible enhancement the report was a bit of a disappointment to
me. At 28 pages it 'goes on a bit' and for the most part if you are
looking for that roadmap you can skip the first 26 pages and move to
the summary, the earlier pages are just a typical government 'look at
all the programs we have to help you' self congratulatory bit of
bafflegap with no real details of the hundreds of programs named. I
will however highlight a few bits that caught my eye.
The first bit that had me less than enthusiastic about reading the
rest was the introduction letter from The Honourable Jeff
Leal,Minister of Rural Affairs where he says:-
“
Working together, we have made a lot of progress over the
past decade. Since 2003, rural
Ontario has benefited from the hundreds of schools and
hospitals that have been built
or renovated. In addition, 68 Family Health Teams are providing
high-quality care to over
458,823 rural Ontarians. In terms of infrastructure, we have
built or rebuilt more than
7,900 kilometres of roads, constructed over 950 new bridges and
provided millions of
rural Ontarians with high-speed internet access. But there is
still work to be done”
Yes, new schools have been built – in the nearest town often a
long bus ride from the closed local school which was the attraction
for families to stay or move to that community. The 'centralization'
of schools to larger towns does nothing to help with the demise of
the smaller communities and from what I am hearing does little to
improve the educational opportunities and services available to kids
and parents. In fact it makes it more difficult for kids to attend
after school activities and for parents to be involved with their
child’s education.
Family Health Teams? Well maybe there has been some progress but
it is still almost impossible for some folks to get timely health
care at other than the Emergency Department of that (in town)
Hospital.
Infrastructure? Again maybe, but with most rural areas tax base
stable or declining and some bridges beyond their best before date it
is still a big challenge for smaller rural municipalities to keep up.
As for High Speed Internet I can only repeat
what
I have said here many times before, if the best
I can get here in rural SW Ont is 1MBS on a good day at high cost for
anything over 3GB a month it is hardly comparable with those urban
users who can get true unlimited high speed. Downloading video of any
kind is simply not an option for me!
Now a couple of things from the body of the report:-
“
Since 2002/2003, funding for rural students has increased by
61 per cent. In addition to building and
renovating schools, our government is implementing full-day
kindergarten across rural Ontario to give our kids the best possible
start in life. “
So with the increased costs incurred for transporting,
accommodating and teaching more kids, closing local schools and
building new ones in town how much is actually an increase in funding
available for actually improving education and is that 61% extra for
rural schools or across the entire system?
Other than the availability of good local education the most
important thing to maintain our rural communities is Jobs, jobs ,
jobs. The report goes to great lengths to talk of all the programs
available to assist job seekers and employers but getting more
details of such programs is much harder and for an employer or a job
seeker to use these programs there must be a need for the services
provided by the employer. A quick look at local Job listing will
reveal that unless you are a professional in heath services or
looking for a part time cashiers job you will be looking a long time
(at least in this part of SW Ontario). Also many of the support
programs require you to be 'eligible' for EI, something that those
who have not had steady employment or have been unable to find work
for an extended period may not be able to access.
I wish I had a solution to the lack of jobs which does not seem to
be limited to just rural areas, the only think I can offer is that
the answer seems to be in encouraging small businesses and self
employment. Our own
small
municipality is doing this by once again
hosting a low cost Business Showcase to let local businesses promote
their services and goods.
There are some positives:-
“
Because information is a key part of fostering a dialogue
and creating a unified vision, we need to create one central website
to gather and share that information.”
I have long be advocating for an INTERACTIVE web site for rural
citizens to interact with government and with each other. I will not
go into great lengths here on MY vision but refer you to my
earlier
posts on this subject but suffice to say it
must encourage dialogue within individual rural communities and not
be a one way dissemination of government approved bafflegab. It must
also be not restricted by the need for highspeed unlimited
connections to access or interact on the site.
“
Finally, stakeholders were clear: rural regions have needs
distinct from urban Ontario. Moreover, Ontario as a whole is stronger
when we support rural areas — areas that contribute to the health
and prosperity of the entire province. MRA has a mandate to work
across government to assess the effect of relevant provincial
policies and programs and ensure we achieve the desired results for
rural Ontario”
This point has
been
made time
and
time again, even going back to a
senate
report decades ago, the needs of rural
communities ARE entirely different from that of the urban majority.
The 'summit' of Ontario Ministry of Rural Affairs with Rural Ontario
Institute is a very good start but what government does beyond such
discussions is the important thing. Will the rural minority receive a
little more attention, will smaller municipalities get more help to
upkeep their infrastructure, will that interactive web site see light
of day (and more importantly will rural folks actual use it)? Only
time will tell. All in all the report is more of a regurgitation of
existing programs interspersed with a few promises which may or may
not see light of day than a 'road map' for rural communities!
Thanks must go out in particular to the
Rural
Ontario Institute for hosting this event and
for their work in providing links to hundreds of sites providing
information for and about programs and reports for rural Ontarians
