City's CAO says despite money spent, more people are relying on social services
A change of direction is under review at Niagara Falls city hall with how taxes are spent, especially for social services.
Chief Administrative Officer Jason Burgess says the number of people relying on social services has doubled, tripled in 15 years, yet they keep throwing money at the problem.
"The number of calls for EMS, the number of calls for police... it's all increasing. And, there's some fundamental issues with society, and the challenges we're facing, including the taxpayer dollars that are going to pay for these services."
He says repeating what they've been doing is not working, which is the definition of insanity.
He added they need to present council with other ideas. "I don't know what that path forward is, there is no expert out there... I've scanned the Federation of Municipalities, they have a website... I've looked at what Vancouver is doing, I've looked at what Finland is doing."
He admits implementing ideas now may not be fruitful for years, but they must at least try.
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