Opposition building to proposed cut to community grants

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Dozens of London’s largest non-profits are pushing back against a bid to ease a tax increase, driven by the police budget, by cutting grants to small community organizations.

By day’s end Friday, 32 executives in health care, education, housing, children’s services, arts and culture and a range of social services had signed a letter heading to a public participation meeting on the city’s 2025 budget update on Nov. 19.

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“In recent years, our sector has seen an unprecedented increase in demand for services, paired with significant funding challenges. Nonprofits are experiencing a heightened need for mental health services, affordable housing, accessible recreational opportunities, and inclusive community spaces,” the letter says.

“The community grants program is the primary municipal funding mechanism supporting this work, particularly for smaller, grassroots organizations that reach those most in need.”

The smaller organizations in the city rely on the grants, sometimes as the only source of funding and sometimes to leverage more money from other sources, said Paul Hubert, chief executive of Pathways Employment Centre and one of the signatories.

“These are smaller groups, serving marginalized populations, doing innovative work. They don’t fit into any other funding bucket,” Hubert said. “The grants are about strengthening the fabric of the community.”

For example, the grants recently have gone to programs that help low-income children and teens, newcomers to the city, neighbourhoods that need more food, and women at high risk of abuse and violence, he said.

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“The Grinch is alive and well on council if they do this to the people who are mostly serving the most vulnerable,” said Jacqueline Thompson, executive director of LifeSpin that serves low-income Londoners. She’s also signed the letter.

Many of the community grants go to shoe-string startup organizations that fill a need arising in London, Thompson said.

“Every single dollar goes into organizations helping the most vulnerable in our community. When the city says we’re going to be a city of opportunity supporting everyone, young families, seniors, newcomers, long-term residents alike, those are the things that are created from the ground up to help.”

Pillar Nonprofit Network is leading the campaign to convince council to reject a proposal that would see $500,000 a year in community grants cut to $250,000 at best and zero at worst.

Council is trying to solve a problem of its own making, a large increase to the police budget, by cutting funding to small organizations that help Londoners who need help the most, Pillar’s chief executive Maureen Cassidy says.

London’s four-year city budget crafted by Mayor Josh Morgan and approved by council early this year includes 8.7 per cent this year and calls for increases of 7.4 per cent in 2025, 6.4 per cent in 2026 and 6.8 per cent in 2027.

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More than half of the 2024 hike comes from the police budget, which got a 28 per cent increase in 2024 and will cost $672 million during four years, an average of $168 million annually.

The police budget included buying a second armoured vehicle, electric vehicles and drones, rebuilding headquarters, hiring more officers and building a training centre, and was passed with little debate at council.

The police board spent more than $100,000 of tax dollars to hire a public relations firm to sell the police budget to taxpayers and politicians.

In the summer, Mayor Josh Morgan created a task force to find budget savings and one of the first proposals was cutting the community grants program.

That proposal likely will be one of the measures discussed as council finalizes some amendments to the 2024-2027 budget over the next few weeks.

The cuts to the community grants would reduce property taxes by 0.02 per cent.

LifeSpin is one of the organizations that receives a community grant, about $20,500 a year to hire a part-time worker who helps people get social assistance.

“She is doing one-on-one help for clients who need paperwork for getting income, to survive. They might be too frail to do it, they might be disabled, or not have the numerical or literacy skills to fill out all those forms,” Thompson said.

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Last year, that employee helped 6,000 individual clients in 2,580 families, including 150 seniors, said LifeSpin program co-ordinator Meagen Ciufo.

Without that help, people are lost in a confusing system and are put at risk of losing their housing, she said.

Council doesn’t seem to understand the impact of the proposed cut, Ciufo said.

“It shows they’re not prioritizing those most in need, the low-income members of our community. These are vital services and it shows a lack of care to those who need it most.”

The London Food Bank, one of the first to sign the letter heading to council, works with organizations that receive community grants to distribute food in city neighbourhoods.

“It allows us to do what we always wanted to do, move food closer to the people so they didn’t have to come to the food bank,” food bank co-director Glen Pearson said.

For years, the city urged the food bank to help distribute food in neighbourhoods and are now threatening to cut a related budget item to save .02 per cent, he said.

“That sends all the wrong signals for hardly any money,” Pearson said.

rrichmond@postmedia.com

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