GREENSTONE – During a recent council meeting, Ccuncil voted unanimously in favour of increasing fees for the Rural Transportation Program and Aging at Home Transportation Program.
The Aging at Home Transportation Program will now cost $350 per person for a round trip to Thunder Bay or a similar distance.
During the discussion, Coun. Fran Koning pointed out that she has received feedback from several of her constituents regarding the cost to travel.
“When we first discussed this, I just assumed wrongly that $350 represented what people get for travel grants and because I have never taken a travel grant in my life, I had no idea how much they received. Apparently, for Geraldton, it's $180 approximately. I've had a lot of people say that above and beyond that, another $170 for some people is out of reach. This has raised a lot of other questions,” Koning said.
CAO Mark Wright clarified that $350 charge was the lowest estimate to provide the service when compared to the alternative modes of transportation, which is intended to cut out those extra expenses by providing the same-day round-trip service.
As for the concerns over the amount of money people get from the province's Northern Travel Grant, there is no easy answer.
The Ministry of Health has a set formula for how they calculate the travel grant. According to the Ministry the travel grant “is calculated based on the distance to the closest medical specialist or ministry-funded health care facility. The one-way road distance is multiplied by two, a deductible of 100 kilometres is subtracted, then the remaining distance is multiplied by 41 cents per kilometre to determine the grant amount.”
Therefore, if a person travels 269 kilometres from Greenstone to Thunder Bay’s regional hospital and back, the grant will award $179.58.
“There is a reason why they've actually calculated that as the total cost of operating an average vehicle without the driver,” said Wright.