Community Living Elgin is the service provider in St. Thomas and Elgin county for the Ontario Early Years Child and Family Centres program, known as EarlyON. Its contract expires at the end of the year with the city proposing a new delivery model with three geographic zones. City manager Wendell Graves says it has yet to be determined whether Community Living Elgin can bid to be the operator in all three zones.
If it is limited to bidding on just one zone, it could mean layoff notices, warns Darren Connolly, chairman of the agency’s board of directors. If Community Living Elgin is not a successful bidder in any of the three zones, Connolly warns termination payments could total as much as $100,000.
Graves says the city is now reviewing the matter of termination pay for any employees who are let go.
With the request for proposals not available until later this week, Graves says it is possible to meet the new start-up date of January 1.
Connolly adds, “We are disappointed in the lack of communication, and that our employees found out about this as it went to council. And we have still to receive formal notice of contract termination from the staff at the city.”
