This tool is aimed at housing workers, social workers, community legal clinic workers, OW / ODSP caseworkers, and the many other advocates who work regularly to support people receiving OW and ODSP – those workers who have in the past used CSUMB to help their clients.

The tool allows people in these positions to input information about their clients’ circumstances, what expenses were required, the availability and adequacy of municipal replacement programs, and the outcomes and impacts on their clients. And a geographic mapping function will show the impacts graphically.

Keeping track of this information is important for a number of reasons, including:

1. It will demonstrate the importance of maintaining and/or increasing funding for municipal replacement programs, and of ensuring the creation and maintenance of local municipal replacement programs.

2. As the provincial government takes further steps to reform social assistance, they may be thinking about making similar changes to other benefits. Knowing the impact of the CSUMB change will help inform how restructuring might happen in the future.

Perhaps most importantly, the tool will allow all of us to make sure that there is a public record of what is happening to people across Ontario as a result of the loss of this designated, mandatory benefit to help people on social assistance get or remain housed.

We are not anticipating that the people who are needing assistance will be in a position to find computer access and track this information themselves – we anticipate that they they will be much more likely to instead be worrying about how to resolve their housing issues.

For the English version of the tracking tool, please click here.

For the French version, please click here.

For more information about CSUMB, see our information repository page.

The announcement says that the money “will assist eligible municipalities as they develop and implement their Community Homelessness Prevention Initiative (CHPI) plans. Funds will be allocated to meet the needs of the most vulnerable Ontarians – including social assistance recipients – to ensure their stability through this period of transition as plans are developed.”

The funds will be provided to municipalities for the period January 1, 2013 through March 31, 2014. The entire text of the announcement can be read here: http://news.ontario.ca/mcss/en/2012/12/enhancing-housing-and-homelessness-supports.html

What Does This Announcement Mean?

The December 27 announcement will temporarily restore some of the money that the government intended to save when it decided to eliminate the Community Start-Up and Maintenance Benefit (CSUMB) and transfer half of CSUMB funds to local municipalities.

The decision to move half of CSUMB money to municipalities is part of the provincial government’s overhaul of the way that housing and homelessness supports are funded and administered.

Under the government’s Long-Term Affordable Housing Strategy, a number of housing and homelessness programs are being consolidated in stages over the next three years. The money for these consolidated programs will be given to municipalities, who will use it to fund the housing and homelessness services that low-income people in their local communities need. The idea is to give local municipalities more flexibility to provide whatever housing or homelessness services are needed in their communities, and to provide these services to all people with low incomes regardless of whether they receive social assistance or are working.

The creation of the CHPI is the first stage of consolidation – five programs are being combined (Emergency Hostel Services, Domiciliary Hostels, the Emergency Energy Fund, the Consolidated Homelessness Prevention Program, and the Rent Bank). Including half of CSUMB money in CHPI was unexpected, however, and the way that the money was allocated meant that most municipalities would get significantly less than half of what was previously given to people through CSUMB.

A concerted effort to restore CSUMB was undertaken by individuals, groups, organizations, and municipalities across Ontario, who understood that it would result in more homelessness among people receiving social assistance. They also recognized that municipalities hadn’t been given sufficient time to figure out how they were going to respond, both to the changes in funding administration and to the significantly lower amount of money being provided.

The December 27 announcement is an important and positive move on the part of the provincial government that will provide some measure of help to municipalities to meet the housing-related needs of low-income Ontarians in 2013/14. The announcement would not have happened without the advocacy and organizing work of many, many people across the province.

At this point, municipalities across the province are figuring out how to administer the CHPI money that they are receiving, and what they will do with the additional funds they are getting from the $42 million. Some municipalities are currently creating local programs that will replace CSUMB. Some municipalities are not.

How Will These Changes Affect People Receiving OW or ODSP?

Despite the announcement of the additional $42 million, there are still a number of negative implications for people receiving social assistance.

1. The additional funding does not restore the Community Start-Up and Maintenance Benefit (CSUMB), which ceased to exist as of January 1, 2013 as a mandatory benefit for people receiving Ontario Works or ODSP.

The loss of CSUMB means that people receiving social assistance can no longer count on having access to a benefit that will help them pay for large expenses related to their housing needs.

Instead, part of the money that used to go to CSUMB will be mixed with other funds that are supposed to meet the housing and homelessness needs of all low-income people in local communities.

This change is part of a larger policy trend in Ontario toward “moving benefits out” of social assistance and providing them to all low-income people, regardless of whether or not they are receiving OW or ODSP.

Providing benefits to all low-income Ontarians is a good policy priority. However, expanding eligibility for help to all low-income people while at the same time significantly reducing the amount of money available is not sound social policy.

2. The change is also part of a trend toward eliminating mandatory and needs-based programs.

CSUMB was a needs-based program. Because it was given to all qualifying applicants, the amount of money the province spent from year to year fluctuated depending on how much support people needed.

Now, the annual funding that each municipality gets from the province for CHPI is capped at a fixed amount.

This means that municipalities will now have to manage a capped budget and allocate funds for often competing priorities. Some needs will be met, while others will not.

3. The elimination of CSUMB is also part of this government’s shift in focus toward fiscal austerity.

The government’s rationale for eliminating CSUMB has been the size of the provincial government’s deficit. The Minister has said in the media: “no one wanted to do it, but again, we had to make the budget balance.”

The provincial government made a commitment to reducing poverty through the creation of the province’s historic five-year Poverty Reduction Strategy in 2008. All parties in the Ontario Legislature reiterated that commitment through their unanimous support for the Poverty Reduction Act that was passed in 2009.

Eliminating CSUMB and reducing housing and homelessness supports for the sake of balancing the provincial budget flies in the face of the commitment to poverty reduction.

4. Whether or not people receiving OW or ODSP will have access to money for the kinds of expenses that CSUMB used to cover will depend on where in Ontario they live. This undermines the principle that people who rely on social assistance should have consistent access to benefits across the province.

Some municipalities are currently creating replacement programs for CSUMB. Some municipalities are not. And some replacement programs are temporary measures, put in place until they figure out their longer-term local housing and homelessness plans.

The additional $42 million will help municipalities in the short-term, but that funding will run out as of March 2014. Whether or not municipal replacement programs will continue to exist after that time is unknown.

People receiving social assistance, their allies and their advocates will now have to advocate with their local municipal governments, both now and at budget time every year, to underline the importance of providing CSUMB-like benefits under CHPI. Local advocacy work will have to be done each year to ensure that municipal budgets for these benefits are not reduced but instead increased.

5. The elimination of CSUMB from social assistance means the loss of appeal rights and therefore a loss of access to justice.

Until January 1, 2013, if a person on social assistance was denied CSUMB, they had the statutory right to appeal the denial to the Social Benefits Tribunal, which is a quasi-judicial body that can make determinations of decisions that affect an individual’s eligibility for or amount of social assistance.

Now, any decision that will be made about whether or not a person receives funding from a municipal replacement program will not be appealable to the Social Benefits Tribunal. There may be the opportunity to ask for an internal review, but an internal review does not provide the same level of protection from incorrect or arbitrary decision-making.

This loss of oversight means the loss of fairness and protection for Ontarians receiving social assistance.

6. The elimination of CSUMB and the transfer of half the funds to municipal administration constitute a major change in social assistance policy.

The provincial government made this major change unilaterally and without any consultation – either with people receiving assistance themselves and their advocates and allies, or with municipalities, who now have to determine how to respond to the continuing need for this benefit among people receiving OW and ODSP. The change also appears to have been made without any analysis of the negative impact it would have on people and communities.

In addition, this major policy change was undertaken while the government’s Social Assistance Review Commission was still in the process of making recommendations on reforming the system as a whole.

As the government moves forward on reforming the social assistance system in Ontario, this type of unilateral, non-consultative, and improperly evaluated reform cannot take place again. Reform must be undertaken in a way that is transparent, consultative, fact-based, and has clearly articulated objectives to which all parties have agreed. It will be critically important that people receiving assistance and their advocates and allies push for such a process.

Where Can People Receiving OW or ODSP Go for Help?

People who are receiving OW or ODSP who have expenses like those that used to be covered by CSUMB should talk to their caseworker to find out if their local municipality has set up a local replacement fund.

What Can I Do About All This?

There are both short-term and longer-term actions that can be taken to try to mitigate some of the worst impacts of this change.

• Short-Term

 1. Ask Liberal Leadership Candidates to Reinstate the CSUMB

The Ontario Liberal Party will be choosing its new Leader – and therefore Ontario’s new Premier – at a leadership convention January 25-27.

An immediate action to take is to contact each of the Liberal leadership candidates to ask them to commit to restoring CSUMB as a social assistance benefit if they become Liberal leader.

• Eric Hoskins                    Email: ehoskins.mpp.co@liberal.ola.org
• Gerard Kennedy               E-mail: ccarter-edwards@gerardkennedy.ca
• Sandra Pupatello              Email: sandra@signup4sandra.ca
• Charles Sousa                 Email: info@VoteSousa.ca
• Harinder Takhar               Email: takhar@votetakhar.com
• Kathleen Wynne               Email: contact@kathleenwynne.ca

2. Make Sure Your Municipality Has a Temporary Replacement Program

As mentioned above, some municipalities across Ontario are creating new, local programs to make sure that people receiving social assistance continue to have access to funding for expenses that CSUMB used to cover. But some municipalities are not.

Now that the interim funding has been announced, it is even more important to contact your local municipal councillors and urge them to make sure that a replacement program is created.

A good replacement program is one that operates like CSUMB did:

1. It specifically targets financial support to people on OW and ODSP;
2. It ensures that people in particularly vulnerable situations are targeted;
3. It helps people pay for a wide variety of expenses related to securing new housing and/or staying in their home;
4. It provides the same amount of funding that CSUMB used to provide (up to $799 for a single person or up to $1500 for people with children);
5. It has an appeal process so that people who are denied the funding the right to have that decision reviewed.

See our original campaign backgrounder for more information about how CSUMB used to work: http://sareview.ca/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/Backgrounder-for-General-Distribution.doc

Local municipalities are in the process of creating their budgets for the next year right now, so make sure to contact them immediately.

•  Longer-Term

1.   Urge Your Municipality to Create a Permanent CSUMB-Like Program

Under the Long-Term Affordable Housing Strategy, municipalities have an obligation to create local housing and homelessness plans by January 1, 2014 and that these plans must identify the needs in their community and how they will be addressed. The provincial government has stated that plans have to be developed in consultation with the public.

Contact your local municipality and ask how you can get involved in the public consultations to develop a local housing and homelessness plan.

Advocate with your local municipal politicians and staff for a permanent program that will address the needs of vulnerable social assistance recipients to establish and maintain a decent home.

2.   Track the Impact of the Loss of CSUMB

ISAC and the Wellesley Institute have created an online tool that housing workers and others who support people receiving social assistance can use to track the impact of the loss of CSUMB on the people they work with.

Making sure that we know what happened to people as the result of the loss of this benefit will be important for a number of reasons, including:

a)     It will demonstrate the importance of maintaining and/or increasing funding for municipal replacement programs, and of ensuring the creation and maintenance of local municipal replacement programs.

b)     As the provincial government takes further steps to reform social assistance, they may be thinking about making similar changes to other benefits. Knowing the impact of the CSUMB change will help inform how restructuring might happen in the future.

The tracking tool can be accessed through ISAC’s website at: http://sareview.ca/isac-news/tracking-tool-loss-of-csumb.

We have created a page on ISAC’s Social Assistance Review website as a repository of information about CSUMB and efforts to have it restored – our backgrounders, information from government, and other tools and resources. The page is at: http://sareview.ca/isac-resources/csumb-info-repository/.

Click here to download this update in Word

Cliquer ici pour la version française

In June 2012, ISAC partnered with our sister legal clinic ACTO (the Advocacy Centre for Tenants Ontario) and community legal clinics across the province to begin a campaign to protest the elimination of CSUMB from social assistance, which was announced in the March 2012 provincial budget.

A number of resources were and are being created for that work, which are shared below. You will also find links below to a number of government documents and resources about CSUMB, including information on the government’s December 27 announcement of a one-time grant of $42 million to help municipalities cope in the short-term with the funding shortfall caused by the elimination of CSUMB.

We hope that these resources will assist people receiving social assistance, their allies, and advocates in their ongoing work on this issue across the province.

Check back often for more resources as we upload them.

ISAC and Partners Resources:

Update on CSUMB – Jan 17, 2013 – ISAC / ACTO

This update provides information on and analysis of the government’s Dec 27, 2012 announcement and ideas for continuing action

• English
• French

Impact Tracking Tool – ISAC / Wellesley Institute

Use this online tool – with mapping function! – to help us keep track of the impacts to individuals of the loss of CSUMB

• Tracking Tool Webpage (the tool is available in both English and French)

What Each Municipality is Doing (or Not) to Replace CSUMB

Now that partial CSUMB funding has been downloaded to municipalities in the consolidated CHPI fund, each of the 47 municipalities responsible for social services administration across Ontario (actually called Service Managers – see below) is determining how to spend that money. Some are responding to the loss of CSUMB by creating replacement programs. This table shows the major aspects of each replacement program by municipality.

The information in this table is preliminary and subject to change. People receiving OW or ODSP who are seeking assistance with these expenses should contact their caseworker for assistance and direction. We will update the table as new information becomes available, so check back often.

• Information on Municipal Replacement Programs – Jan 23 2013

Letter to Liberal Leadership Candidates – ISAC / ACTO

The following template letter was sent to each of the leadership candidates on December 14 to urge them to state their position on the elimination of CSUMB. The letter can be used as the basis of communications with the candidates prior to the January 25-27 Liberal leadership convention, urging the candidates to reinstate CSUMB if they become Leader and, therefore, Premier of Ontario.

• Letter
• Leadership Candidates’ Contact Information

Backgrounder on CSUMB and the Home Repairs Benefit – Aug 2012 – ISAC / ACTO

• English
• French

Wellesley Institute / ISAC / Other Partners – Health Equity Impact Assessment – Nov 2012

• The Real Cost of Cutting the Community Start-Up and Maintenance Benefit

Other Resources:

Government’s Announcement re: $42 million One-time Grant Funding for CHPI – Dec 27, 2012

• English
• French

Government of Ontario’s Program Guidelines for CHPI (the Community Homelessness Prevention Initiative)

CHPI is the new consolidated program under Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing that received partial CSUMB funding. CHPI is being administered by the 47 municipalities responsible for social services administration across Ontario – they are actually called DSSABs or CMSMs (District Social Services Administration Boards or Consolidated Municipal Service Managers) or, more simply, Service Managers.

• English
  
• French (having difficulty uploading this – will be uploaded asap)
  

Memo from MCSS ADM of Social Policy – Dec 27, 2012

This is a memo that outlines the amounts of money that each local municipality will receive for CHPI and as part of the $42 million one-time grant announced Dec 27, 2012.

• English
• French version is unavailable

Government’s 2010 Long-Term Affordable Housing Strategy

See page 15 for mention of the requirement for community consultations for Local Housing and Homelessness Plans. More info on this will be coming soon from ACTO.

• English
• French

The Provincial-Municipal Fiscal and Service Delivery Review

Through the PMFSDR, which was agreed to in 2008, the provincial government committed to consolidating housing and homelessness funding and to giving municipal Service Managers more flexibility in administering these funds.

• English
• French

Ontario Budget 2012-13 – addendum

This is the addendum to the budget, which is where the elimination of CSUMB was announced in March 2012.

• English
• French

MCSS Directives on CSUMB

These directives, which were removed in January 2013, provide in depth information on CSUMB, including eligibility, benefit amounts, etc.

• OW Directive 7.5 – English
• OW Directive 7.5 – French
• ODSP Directive 9.2 – English
• ODSP Directive 9.2 – French

In this webinar, Jennefer Laidley of the Income Security Advocacy Centre (ISAC) provides an understanding of

• the content of the report and recommendations;
• an analysis of the impact of the recommendations;
• the policy and political context surrounding the report; and,
• thoughts on opportunities for action over the short, medium, and longer term.

This webinar was conducted for members of the community legal clinic system and their community-based partner groups; however, we recorded the webinar for other interested individuals and groups to watch.

The powerpoint slides used in this presentation are available here for download in PDF.

Thanks to Your Legal Rights, a website of free legal information for people in Ontario, for partnering with ISAC to host and share this webinar. Your Legal Rights is a project of CLEO (Community Legal Education Ontario).

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The Wellesley Institute and ISAC – along with ACTO, the AOHC, Street Health, and the Peterborough County-City Health Unit – have partnered to produce a new report, “The Real Cost of Cutting the Community Start-Up and Maintenance Benefit: A Health Equity Impact Assessment.”

The report calls on the provincial government to halt the planned elimination of CSUMB and reinstate the $67 million in funding.

Access to housing that is safe and affordable is a key determinant of health, and the cancellation of the CSUMB has the potential to increase the number of low income Ontarians who are precariously housed or who are homeless. This paper sets out some of the potential health implications of this decision through an equity lens.

Below is the press release that was sent out today to announce the release of the report – and five things you can do to combat the cut.

MEDIA RELEASE – For Immediate Release

TORONTO – People receiving social assistance will be a greater risk of homelessness if the provincial government’s plan to eliminate the Community Start-Up and Maintenance Benefit (CSUMB) is realized. A new report, “The Real Cost of Cutting the Community Start-Up and Maintenance Benefit: A Health Equity Impact Assessment,” calls on the provincial government to halt the planned elimination and reinstate the $67 million in funding.

Community groups and municipalities are increasingly alarmed about the real cost of the provincial government’s plan to cut this key housing benefit, which will take effect on January 1. The province is downloading only half of the program’s funding to municipalities to run local housing and homelessness programs. Municipalities are struggling to plug the funding gap.

The elimination of the CSUMB means that people on social assistance who have unexpected or large housing-related costs could lose their housing and end up homeless. The report, from a collaboration of six health, income security, and housing organizations, says that cutting the benefit may have significant negative health impacts for people who are already among the most vulnerable in Ontario, including the homeless, women, children, and people with disabilities.

The report warns that without the CSUMB, women in transition shelters fleeing domestic violence won’t be able to afford moving costs when they find a safe home. People trying to move from homeless shelters into housing will be impacted, as well as many others, including people who are moving out of institutions, or who are trying to leave substandard housing wrought with bedbug infestations, mould and other poor housing conditions that lead to serious health problems.

Approximately 16,000 Ontarians access the CSUMB each month to assist with emergency housing costs they could not otherwise afford, including rent payment to avoid eviction, avoiding utility cut off, and leaving an abusive domestic situation. Families are eligible to receive up to $1,500 every two years and singles are entitled to up to $799.

To read the report go to: http://www.wellesleyinstitute.com/publication/the-real-cost-of-cutting-csumb/.

Five Things You Can Do to Combat the Cut!

1. Send an email – automatically! – to the Ministers urging them to restore the CSUMB. Your email will also be sent to Opposition critics. Then FORWARD THE LINK to your friends, colleagues, clients, and get them to send an email too.

2. Download the template letter and circulate it to your friends, clients, people you work with – have them sign and send it to their MPP.

3. Contact your local MPP - call them to ask for a meeting, or send an email or letter to them directly. Tell them what the elimination of CSUMB is going to mean in your community. Ask them what they’re going to do to help restore the CSUMB.

• If you don’t know the name of your MPP or your Electoral District, go to the Elections Ontario website and use your postal code or address to look them up: http://fyed.elections.on.ca/fyed/en/form_page_en.jsp.
• To get their contact information, once you know their name, go to the Ontario Legislature addresses list to get their contact information: http://www.ontla.on.ca/web/members/members_current.do?locale=en&channel_id={923146e7-4d81-42a8-99f0-e61f5ab50387}&lang=en.

4. If you are receiving OW or ODSP and have expenses that could make you eligible for CSUMB, make sure that you contact your caseworker to apply for funding right away! The program ends December 31.

5. If you work with people receiving OW or ODSP, here is a toolkit that you can use to help them apply.

“It is time to move social assistance away from punishment and surveillance and toward dignity and support,” said Mary Marrone, Director of Advocacy and Legal Services. “The first step must be to evaluate the Commission’s recommendations in consultation with the people who will be most affected – those on OW and ODSP.”

The Commission’s report arose out of a commitment to review social assistance made by the provincial government in its 2008 Poverty Reduction Strategy. The report recommends establishing a stakeholder advisory committee, and using a number of frameworks – including an equity framework and a newly-created disability framework – to move forward on reform.

“The report includes some important recommendations, many of which reflect a broad-based consensus,” said Marrone. “We urge the province to act immediately on these – including improving income adequacy, increasing asset limits, improving supports for employment, providing a 50% exemption for child support payments, improving access to other supports like childcare and housing, and expanding drug and dental benefits to all low income Ontarians”.

Marrone noted that other recommendations should clearly not be adopted by government.

“The impact of the Commission’s recommendations on people with disabilities are potentially serious and far-reaching”, said Marrone. “After nearly two decades of erosion of benefits, including the recent elimination of the Community Start-up and Maintenance Benefit, more cuts or reductions simply cannot be made,” said Marrone. “And rolling the Special Diet Allowance into the ‘standard rate’ would be devastating to people with serious medical conditions.” The Commission’s proposed benefit structure means many people with disabilities would see reduced benefit rates.

The report also discusses ‘trade-offs’ that must be made in determining the level of income that people would receive. “We don’t accept that income adequacy should be balanced off against any other measure,” said Marrone. “Government must make a commitment to ensure that people on social assistance have incomes that meet their needs and provide them and their families with adequate levels of support.”

The Commission’s report also proposes expanding participation requirements to people with disabilities, despite barriers they face in the labour market. “Yes, people with disabilities need improved access to the labour market and they need improved employment services, as recommended by the report,” said Marrone. “But they don’t need more rules that could jeopardize their ability to pay the rent and put food on the table.”

Marrone also noted that there are other ideas in the report that may have positive transformative potential, but that require additional research and analysis.

“The conversation about social assistance reform must continue because the status quo is unacceptable,” said Marrone. “We welcome the opportunity to speak to all the provincial parties about the implications of the Commission’s report and the positive steps that they can all take moving forward.”

- 30 -

NOTE: ISAC will be providing additional analysis of the Commission’s report in the coming weeks.

Every month, thousands of people in Ontario need the Community Start-up and Maintenance Benefit (CSUMB) and the Home Repairs Benefit (HRB) to stay housed or establish a new home. These benefits work because:

• They are targeted to people on social assistance (OW and ODSP) who are among the most vulnerable in Ontario. People on assistance have very low incomes and cannot afford these expenses otherwise.
• They provide direct assistance. The benefits help people move into a new home, pay rent or utility arrears, get major repairs done to their home, or help them move to safer or more secure housing.
• If CSUMB is denied, there is a right to appeal. This ensures fairness, accountability and transparency so that people in need will not be unfairly turned away.

The provincial government’s budget measures have eliminated these critically important programs.

The HRB ended June 30, 2012. Starting January 2013, half of CSUMB money will go to municipal housing and homelessness programs, which serve an even larger pool of low-income people. The other half is simply cut from the budget.

Because of these cuts, homelessness in our communities will rise.  Women leaving domestic violence, people leaving shelters or the hospital, people with disabilities, and many others will find it harder to establish a new or safer household. Demand for other already overburdened community services will rise.

We need to act now to save these benefits!

Your MPP needs to hear that people in the community value these benefits, and that the cuts must be reversed.

On Friday, Sept. 28^th take 5 minutes to help save the HRB and CSUMB!  

Find your MPP’s phone number here: http://www.ontla.on.ca/web/members/member_addresses.do.

If you don’t know who your MPP is, enter your address or postal code here: http://fyed.elections.on.ca/fyed/en/form_page_en.jsp.

Use the CSUMB HRB Sept 28 call-in flyer as the basis for what to tell your MPP.

You can also edit the flyer with your local MPPs number to encourage your friends or colleagues to join you in calling your local MPP to raise this issue

For more information on this campaign see: http://sareview.ca/isac-news/act-now-to-save-housing-supports-for-people-on-ow-and-odsp/

• Download the Housing Supports Template here in order to send it as a hard copy letter to the politicians. You can also distribute it at community meetings or events.

• Use this Backgrounder in advocacy efforts in your own community. La version française est disponsible ici.

• And here is a Toolkit for Frontline Workers, developed by Parkdale Community Legal Services, to help people apply for the Community Start-Up and Maintenance Benefit before the end of December 2012. People on social assistance themselves will probably find this toolkit helpful as well.

• And watch this space for more information and tools!

The Coalition is a provincial group advocating for people with disabilities on ODSP and considers the Social Assistance Review the most important opportunity in decades to improve ODSP so that people with disabilities can live with dignity. Unfortunately, the Coalition is increasingly worried that any restructuring that comes out of the review will be more about reducing the costs of ODSP than improving the lives of people with disabilities.

This Lobby Kit lays out the Coalition’s key messages to MPPs and also provides helpful lobbying tips and templates.

Download the full 18-page lobby kit:

• Coalition Lobby Kit – Word version
  
• Coalition Lobby Kit – PDF version

The Coalition has also created the following additional background materials for advocates to give to MPPs or distribute in their communities.

These materials can also be helpful when preparing for meetings with MPPs.

• Social Assistance Rates and Adequacy Backgrounder
  
• Key Messages Backgrounder
• Coalition’s Response to the Commission’s Options Paper (second discussion paper)
  
• Positive or Punitive?
• Coalition’s Responses to the Commission’s First Discussion Paper
• Dignity, Adequacy, Inclusion: Summary or Full Submission
• An Activation Agenda for ODSP: Summary or Full Submission

Here is ISAC’s complete submission in response to the discussion paper

La présentation est disponible en français ici

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Originally posted March 15:

Since the release of the Commission’s second discussion paper, ISAC has been reviewing the paper in detail to both provide information on what the paper says, and to craft the best response possible by the Commission’s March 16 feedback deadline.

To create a response that addresses the issues that affect groups that deal with the most disadvantage in our economy and in society, we’ve been working with partners in the community legal clinic system and community partners with concerns around the impact of social assistance on people with disabilities, women, members of racialized communities, and newcomers.

We are still hosting meetings with our community partners, but have reached the point at which we can share draft elements of our submission to the Commission. While some aspects of these documents may change, we hope that that they will be of assistance to others who are writing their own submissions to the Commission.

Please check this page frequently over the coming day or two for additions or updates:

• Introduction and Overview
• An Equity Approach to Employment Supports
• Redefining Income Tradeoffs
• Simplification and Adequacy
• Audits and Rule Changes
• Assets
• Program Delivery
• Interactions with Other Programs
• Program for People with Disabilities