With a provincial election decided and a municipal vote scheduled for the fall, the timing was right for an update on social services in Wellington.
The vast majority of us are lucky to have gainful employment and a sense of purpose. It’s an enviable situation to be in, certainly when compared to those relying on social services to survive.
The cancellation of the guaranteed income program study by the Doug Ford Conservatives was in many ways an action that will prove short-sighted. We’ve heard the lingo, about the fat-cats on welfare and living large off the taxpayer. People we would presume to know better buy into the narrative without a full set of facts, let alone the math that clearly repudiates these notions.
Median household income across Wellington County stretches from $63,712 in Wellington North to $111,808 in Puslinch. Averaging that to $88,000 for discussion purposes there is roughly $7,300 of monthly household income to pay for lodging, utilities, vehicles, food and incidentals. It sounds like a lot but after taxes, let’s say there is $3,500 for paying all of these bills.
Imagine then being a single person getting by on $721 per month. Harder yet, let’s imagine a couple raising two kids under the Ontario Disability Support Program at $1,858 per month. Most of us know what housing and groceries cost. There is no fat, when viewed in a realistic context.
Case in point, as we typed away this past Tuesday a supplier dropped by after showing his rental property where one bedroom units go for $900 per month plus utilities. There is a problem here that perhaps illustrates the fatal flaw skeptics find with capitalism. Sometimes the market leaves people behind and in our estimation that is getting worse.
Anyone running for office this fall, particularly at the county level should have a handle on this issue. The votes may not come from this forgotten segment of society, but it is the right thing to do to. People cannot survive and prosper if living in a state of despair.
We have long been proponents of developing housing that addresses the needs of the more vulnerable in society. Billboards proposing houses starting “in the low 500’s” must seem a cruel joke for the disadvantaged and the working poor who would be hard pressed to cover the taxes and utilities, let alone save up a down-payment and qualify for a mortgage.
It remains our belief that safe, affordable housing is the foundation to a better quality of life. Surely more can be done to come up with creative solutions. One such novel idea was just announced in Waterloo Region where potential landlords were offered loans up to $25,000 to fix up a rental or make an illegal one legal. Where there is a will, there is a way. From what we see many ways are desperately needed.
So the next time the urge hits to pile-on with the loudest voice in the room about deadbeats – resist. Truth be told, most of us are a few pay cheques or a bad health diagnosis away from despair ourselves.
