Ice money

West Street in Wellington was one of many streets closed by the ice storm last December

Province drags feet, but promised funding is in the works

This week is the anniversary of a massive storm that coated much of southern Ontario in a thick sheet of ice, causing extensive damage to roads, trees, homes and hydro lines throughout the province. In Prince Edward County alone, the damages are estimated to be roughly half a million dollars in value.

In January, talk of disaster relief funds began. The province’s disaster relief assistance program is designed to help municipalities, individuals, businesses or organizations recover from natural disasters, most commonly from flooding. Although the damage caused by the ice storm qualified the event as a disaster, it became clear the area the storm covered was too extensive for this program to manage.

Instead, the ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing created the Ice Storm Assistance Program, and $190 million was set aside specifically for damage related to the ice storm of December 21 and 22, 2013.

The program had a multi-step process. Municipalities had until June 16, 2014 to submit an expression of interest to claim funds. They could claim related costs incurred up to June 22, since some infrastructure damage couldn’t be repaired until spring.

Late in the summer, the paperwork for the final claim submissions was distributed to eligible municipalities. James Hepburn, the County’s finance manager, described the process as “onerous.”

Ultimately it will be the federal treasury that pays the bill, but it is delegated to the the province’s the responsibility to manage the claims process and ensure the valitity of each submission. Working between two layers of government is cumbersome—particularly in special and unique circumstances. Adding another layer government has compounded the complexity.

The final submission was initially due at the end of October. Municipalities protested this deadline, claiming the paperwork involved was too complicated for that deadline to be achieved. In response the deadline was extended to the end of this year, two weeks from today. The ministry has assured municipalities the deadline is not a strict one. If the necessary documents take longer to gather, late submissions will be accepted.

Hepburn says the County will submit its application before that deadline.

“You couldn’t respond with the actual claim until at least September, and then they just recently, during November, had some additional webinars showing how to fill up the forms and what types of things were eligible and what things weren’t eligible,” says Hepburn. “So it’s the reason for nobody having submitted it. Nobody could submit it until such time as they’d provided all this information.”

Earlier this month, the Toronto Star reported that of the municipalities that had expressed interest, only one had submitted a final claim. The town of Mapleton in the province’s southwest claimed $23,009 in damages. Larger municipalities, especially in the GTA, have damage claims in the millions. The County will be claiming $450,000. That is slightly less than its original estimate, after Hepburn learned this fall some items are not eligible, such as costs for removing broken tree canopies not directly related to road clearance and public safety.

Mark Cripps, who works for the ministry of Municipal Affairs and Housing, says, as of Monday, the ministry has received nine applications from the 53 municipalities and six conservation authorities eligible for funding. The ministry expects most applications to arrive within the next two weeks.

Cripps says the municipalities and conservation authorities who apply before the deadline will begin to see funding from the province early in the new year, provided the applications are completed correctly. The province will not attempt to recoup the costs from the federal treasury until all applications have been processed.