Ottawa Public Health facing up to $3.3M in budget pressures in 2025

Ottawa City Hall is seen in this undated file photo. (CTV News Ottawa)

Ottawa Public Health is facing several budget pressures as it looks ahead to 2025.

The Ottawa Board of Health met Monday afternoon to discuss preliminary budget details ahead of final approval of the budget directions by city council, which include a 2.9 per cent increase to most city departments.

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The board heard that 2025 is a "transitional year", as the provincial government looks to revise its public health funding formula for 2026.

A presentation for the board showed that Ottawa Public Health needs at least $2.3 million more in 2025 to sustain current service levels, and the figure could be as high as $3.3 million, based on preliminary estimates.

"OPH's financial challenges stem from historical underfunding, along with our ongoing efforts to meet priority needs by reallocating resources based on emerging priorities," said Business and Development Support Services manager Mohammad Kibria in the presentation.

A report prepared for the board showed that OPH's cost-shared budget shortfall was $8.4 million in 2021 and has since grown to $11.3 million.

"This consistent underfunding has challenged OPH’s ability to respond to local needs, especially in the areas of safe food and water inspections, and the prevention and control of infectious diseases. We urge the Ministry of Health to address this issue," the report states.

The initial estimated budget pressures for 2025 include the anticipated cost-of-living adjustment and an inflationary adjustment to sustain current service levels.

OPH still expects to present a balanced budget by utilizing provincial base funding growth of 1 per cent, which is approximately $400,000; incorporating the provincial increase in Healthy Babies Healthy Children base funding of $900,000; reallocating costs, such as by not contributing $200,000 to an Information Technology reserve in 2025; and recognizing that the City of Ottawa will cover the cost-of-living adjustment in the 2025 budget.

The draft OPH budget is set to be tabled in November.

2026 review

The Ontario government is expected to launch a revised funding formula for public health units in 2026. During its talks with the province, OPH shared some feedback on how it would like to see the formula change.

In particular, OPH says the annual 1 per cent increase for growth is insufficient, and should match inflation. Population growth should also be considered.

"Ottawa’s population has grown 7 per cent from 2019 to 2023 and is projected to continue to grow, adding 136,000 more residents by 2030. Additionally, OPH’s population share of Ontario’s overall population has grown from 6.3 per cent (2016) to 7.2 per cent (2021), which is a larger increase than 32 other PHUs across Ontario during that time," a report for the board says.

A spokesperson for Health Minister Sylvia Jones says Ontario is restoring the 75-25 cost share for Public Health Units.

"As Minister Jones announced at AMO last August, our government is restoring the 75 provincial, 25 municipal cost share for PHUs and working with PHUs, this is in addition to the increase in base funding every year for the next three years. "

Looking ahead to 2026 and 2027, OPH says it's facing $9.3 million in budgetary pressures related to medium-term growth, such as enhancing and expanding OPH programs, modernizing OPH digital solutions, and making improvements to physical workspaces.

OPH's operating budget in 2024 was $87.5 million, which was $43.9 million lower than the 2023 operating budget, largely because of the end of extraordinary COVID-19 operations. OPH says in 2025 its COVID-19 operations will be fully integrated into the cost-shared base-funded programs.