Mayor-elect Matthew Shoemaker says he looks forward to rekindling the municipality’s relationship with the Sault’s provincial government representative when he takes office later this month. Shoemaker campaigned on a promise to open clearer lines of communication between his office and MPP Ross Romano, especially when it comes to fighting the Sault’s opioid crisis. “Rebuilding the relationship — I think that’s one of the key priorities to get the ear or the attention of the provincial government,” Shumaker said in a phone interview Monday. “I think there needs to be a new way forward with them and I’m committed to having those – hopefully – positive discussions with Ross.” Romano reached out to SooToday in response to outgoing Mayor Christian Provenzano’s recent comments about the province’s response to the opioid crisis. In particular, Romano disputed the following passage from Provenzano: “So in 2017 we asked for capital funds and operating funds and in 2022, on the eve of the election five years later, we got an announcement, I think it was about $20 million in capital and, what was it? $350,000 in operation?’ Provenzano said. “We end up getting $20 million in capital to build something and less than a tenth of what we need to operate. And the critical funds are the operating funds, they’re the funds that pay for the people and the manpower that we need to take care of people, they pay for the support — and we don’t have the facilities yet, let’s be clear about that.” Romano said the mayor’s quote is a misrepresentation, especially when it comes to the issue of operating funds. He remembers that 2017 funding request well because it was submitted to the former Ontario Liberal government while he was elected in opposition. The application was unsuccessful and was never funded. At the time, Sault Area Hospital was seeking $11 million in capital funding and just $6 million in operating funds. “The key thing to remember is, at the time, the proposed facility was going to consolidate all of Sault Ste. Marie’s existing services,” Romano said of the 2017 implementation. “The number for the operation was the existing operating money that was already in all these services and how they were going to be consolidated under one roof.” Instead, the $350,000 in the mayor’s quote refers to $343,000 in new operating funds announced last year for Residential Withdrawal Management Services, which is under construction on Old Garden River Road in the former Sault Star building. “Beyond what the service level was in 2017, we have increased the operating money in Sault Ste. Marie by about $2.55 million. This has increased since then. In addition, what was an $11 million capital request — we approved the $20 million capital request,” Romano said. “The need has certainly increased, but with that has increased the receipt of programming and funding — both capital and operational — from the province of Ontario.” Asked about the recently canceled Concurrent Disorders Intensive Day Treatment program, Romano said the decision to close it was made by Sault Area Hospital, which self-funded the program. “It’s not something that’s been applied for in the past, it’s not something that’s been funded, so it’s not something that I can take to our government to say why was this taken away or why was there a problem with this?” Romano said. “At no point did they receive a specific block of funding from the province.” Shoemaker promised during his campaign to champion the opening of a supervised consumption site in Sault Ste. Mary. One of his first meetings before writing his platform was with Desiree Beck, executive director of Willow Addiction Support Services. “Willow is the team that was vital to me getting a better understanding of supervised consumption spaces and coming to the conclusion that this is something that could help the community. All the information they gave me and the information they gave me when I was a candidate helped me get to this point because I just didn’t know enough about it before,” he said. “If we can help one person – and I think it will do more than that – it will be worth the effort.” Last week, Shoemaker met with Connie Raynor-Elliott, founder of Save Our Young Adults (SOYA). It was the first of a series of meetings Shoemaker has planned with local groups on the front lines of the city’s mental health and addiction crisis. “I was really there to hear from them and understand what they wanted to see as a priority in the community, and bringing back the day treatment program is their top priority,” Shoemaker said of the meeting with SOYA. Shoemaker said he would support creating a supervised consumption site and bringing back the Concurrent Disorders Intensive Day Treatment program together. “I think they go well together – if we can put pressure on both of those things, hopefully we can get good results,” he said. He plans to pass this message on to Romano. “We’re meeting next week and that’s one of the agenda items I want to talk to him about,” Shoemaker said. Romano said it’s important for people struggling with mental health and addiction to know that different levels of government work together. “I don’t want someone dealing with an addiction who is thinking about getting some help, feeling like elected officials aren’t going to help and are somehow turning a blind eye to them,” Romano said. “The most important thing for someone struggling with addiction to know that there are services, that help has been provided.” “Can we do more? Yes, absolutely,” Romano said. “We can do more and we want to do more – there is no silver bullet to solve any problem, but it will not help those people in the middle of the crisis to hear that there is nothing or that if they are ignored, they must to know that there are services out there, there is help and additional resources have been brought in to help them.”
