FORT FRANCES — The District of Rainy River Services Board (DRRSB) approved more than $34 million for its 2025 annual budget.
The budget reflects an increase of $1.54 million or 4.74 per cent, funded primarily through its provincial programs.
"This board is committed to balancing fiscal responsibility with meeting the needs of our communities," said Deborah Ewald, the DRRSB's chair.
"The 2025 budget reflects a careful evaluation of new initiatives against our strategic plan, which we just actually updated... This will ensure that we prioritize sustainability and service quality while addressing economic conditions and community needs."
She said this increase demonstrates the DRRSB's dedication to long-term growth and the well-being of the people it serves.
As part of the budget's increase, the municipal share will grow by roughly $243,235 or 4.35 per cent to support anticipated salary increases and inflationary factors for utilities, fuel, building materials, maintenance contracts and equipment.
"Any increase to municipalities is sometimes difficult, but you have to keep up with the times," said Ewald.
"So we're very cognizant of what our municipal share is because, in this district, there are some very small municipalities with a small tax basis, so it's been working it out fairly well."
Under the municipal share, the board will put $3.25 million toward Ontario Works, $10.15 million into Children's Services, $9.96 million for Paramedic Services, $7.99 million in Community Housing and $2.72 million toward Central Administration.
Ontario Works will also receive around a $307,000 increase to reflect the ongoing transformation of employment services introduced last year, including a rise in the year's municipal share of administration funding.
Ewald said the funding has never been changed since 2018 and is 'probably due.'
Paramedic Services also saw an approximately $300,000 increase due to inflationary adjustments with no anticipated increases in provincially funded programs.
Ewald said the board hopes the increase will help meet the region's paramedic service needs.
With more people living in Southern Ontario and often only staying up north after graduating temporarily for jobs before moving back to their families, she explained the big problem is province-wide, there is a shortage of paramedics.
"There are not enough paramedics to go around, so we've been having quite a time as most other paramedic services are in the north to just getting paramedics to stay long term," said Ewald.
"So we're hoping that things will turn about and more people will get into the paramedic field and that will help the situation."
Other programs were not as lucky to receive increases.
Community housing expenditures remained static, with no anticipated program increases.
With a loss of federal funding for public housing and non-profits, the DRRSB was required to use reserves to mitigate the resulting increased costs to municipalities.
Municipal funding for Children's Services similarly remained unchanged.
However, the program has experienced a nearly $1 million growth in government funding through the Ministry of Education's continued development of a new Canada-Wide Early Learning and Child Care funding approach.
"Budgets are hard to do because everyone comes from a different point," said Ewald.
"But the nice thing about our board is everybody pretty much realizes that we have so many vulnerable people to serve and it's good that we can and do provide these services for them because, being in the north, we're not quite as populous as what they are in Southern Ontario."
Although it's a little bit more expensive, Ewald added she thinks the budget worked out well and that there's a lot of good representation from the municipalities in the Rainy River District.
"Hopefully, things will improve and keep improving so that everyone gets the best outcome that they can," said Ewald.
