The Hamilton Children’s Aid Society is set to cut up to 19 staff members in a move an executive says, is due to budget cuts, a decrease in demand, and overwhelmed community support systems.
While it’s the most recognizable agency for kids in crisis, the Children’s Aid Society has a specific role, “our work is working with at-risk families and assessing abuse and neglect and challenges that families are facing related to those issues,” Shone said.
Executive director Bryan Shone says after the height of the pandemic, reports of child abuse and neglect actually decreased. Instead, the agency has been taking on other issues, particularly mental health concerns among children that are not within its scope.
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“Social services in our community are still reopening, especially mental health and developmental services, and that has caused our costs for children and youth that we’re serving in care. It’s actually increased quite substantially as well,” Shone said.
A demand that Shone says will be tough to meet seeing that they’re looking at steep financial cuts down the road, “receiving 2 per cent less in terms of our budget over the next two years to the tune of about $2 million.”
19 front-line, executive, union and non-union jobs are set to be eliminated in the near future, Shone says those affected haven’t been notified. In the end, he says there won’t be cuts to services.
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Shone adds, however, that if other community services such as mental health clinics and affordable housing continue to be scarce, children’s aid worker’s jobs won’t get any easier.
According to the Children’s Mental Health Ontario, 36 per cent of parents have sought help for a child dealing with mental health issues, 40 per cent say they didn’t get help or are still waiting.
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