‘As of right now, with this provincial government, there are only two ways to get off reserves,’ say financial Staff, ‘it’s either to put it on the levy or to reduce services’

The District of Nipissing Social Services Administration Board (DNSSAB) has approved a 2026 budget that includes a 4 per cent increase to the municipal levy and a significant cut to Children’s Services.

The Wednesday afternoon meeting was marked by tough discussions about funding, service pressures, and the use of reserve funds.

Board members agreed to reduce the levy increase from a proposed 6.23 per cent down to 4 per cent, using approximately $435,000 from reserves to soften the impact on municipalities.

The decision comes as the Board faces a roughly $6 million decrease in Children’s Services funding for next year.

“We as a Board finally came to the agreement that we had to come in somewhere in the 4 per cent range increase when we had started at 6.23 per cent,” said DNSSAB Chair Mark King in an interview with BayToday.

“It’s highly difficult to bring those in, given the pressures that are ongoing. But the important section of that is that reserves and the amount of $435,000 were used in order to basically buy down the tax rate increase.”

Members expressed that relying on reserves is not a long-term solution.

“As of right now, with this provincial government, there are only two ways to get off reserves,” said financial Staff. “It’s either to put it on the levy or to reduce services.”

King added, “I don’t think it’s a good number, but it’s the best we can do given the circumstance,” and says the Board felt it was important to provide relief to smaller municipalities in particular.

“We really had to try and somehow provide a break, especially to the smaller communities, because I know they’re really stretched budget-wise,” said King.

The use of reserve funds to balance budgets is a hot topic. Some Board members voiced concern that relying on reserves to cover operating costs only delays future tax increases and could weaken the Board’s financial position.

“Using reserves long term gets into problems because it comes back to actually get you the next year,” King explained.

“Last year, we used $508,000 reserves in order to bring the increase down. And that basically compounded the reserve use this particular year.”

See: Social service agency projects $1.3M deficit despite mid-year surplus

And: DNSSAB achieves goal to keep levy increase below 3 per cent

The Children’s Services budget is seeing the largest cut, with a decrease of about $6 million.

The cut is not due to a lack of need, according to King, but to a lack of service providers being delivered, despite funding being available from the province.

“The problem is that there are no workers,” King said. “They’re just unable to provide the service to use the money provided by the province. There certainly has to be a message that looks at, ‘how do you [encourage] people to work inside childcare?’”

During the meeting, Board members and Staff discussed how government funding, particularly from the province and federal government, is becoming less flexible and less sufficient to meet local needs.

“There is a shortfall that’s occurring on both the provincial and federal side as far as funding envelopes are concerned to maintain these social service support systems,” King said.

“That falls, I think, on my shoulders and senior Staff to explain to the government, both the provincial and federal, what these situations are creating.”

The 2026 budget includes a recommendation to eliminate emergency shelter services outside of extreme cold weather alerts, raising worries about vulnerable families being turned away.

“I’m really concerned about certain individuals who are very vulnerable, for example, children being turned away,” Board member and City of North Bay councillor Justine Mallah said. “I just feel very uncomfortable with the recommendation as it’s written right now.”

Lana Mitchell, Board member, City councillor, and Low Income People Involvement of Nipissing executive director, reassured that, in practice, agencies and shelters work together to make sure no family with children is left without a place to stay.

“I can tell you that I work with every agency in town, and no family with kids will ever get turned away because we’d all be working through the night to figure that one out if we had to,” Mitchell said.

The Board also discussed $405,000 in interest revenue earned from investments, which will go back into the housing sector.

“We do have dollars that we can invest to build,” said King.

The 2026 budget is roughly $105.5 million, with about $70.2 million coming from the provincial and federal governments, and $25.4 million for the municipal share.