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Residents seek Town aid to fight autism funding cuts by David Lea Oakville Beaver Staff 5 | Thursday, June 2, 2016 | OAKVILLE BEAVER | www.insideHALTON.com Oakville Town council voted Monday (May 30) to add its voice to a growing number of people and organizations calling on the Province of Ontario to do better with regard to its policies concerning the treatment of children with autism. Councillors unanimously passed a motion requesting the Province amend its policy to one that would allow all children removed from a Provincial waitlist to receive Intensive Behavioural Intervention (IBI), an intensive and popular treatment program for children with autism. Change incited protest In April, Ontario's Liberal government incited a wave of protests from parents of children with autism when it announced a new $333-million Ontario Autism Program, which includes changes such as limiting IBI to children between two and four years old. The IBI waitlist currently sits at 2,000 and under this policy, families with kids aged five and older on the IBI waitlist would get a onetime payment of $8,000 as they are removed from that list. Monday's motion, which was brought forward by Oakville Mayor Rob Burton and Ward 2 Town Councillor Ray Chisholm, states this policy change left "many families feeling they have been left behind." The difficult position this decision put many The new programs that are coming into effect are not those hours. They are actually minimal hours and they are group settings. They will not deal with the individual child's needs. They will only deal with it from a group setting. Judith Elaine Project Autism With no Provincial IBI available, Athena said she must pay for her daughter's therapy. So far, she estimates she has spent approximately $50,000 per year with just an hour of IBI costing around $130. Athena said she is fortunate as her parents have been able to help her. Parents have helped finance treatment "Because of my parents, my daughter can speak right now and she can call my name," said Athena, choking back tears. When asked what the Province's one-time payment of $8,000 would get her, Athena noted that sum would pay for her daughter's therapy for about eight weeks. Judith Elaine, a representative of the community group, Project Autism, also spoke during the meeting and noted eight weeks of therapy might be enough to teach someone how to tie their shoes. New programs to start in 2018 She pointed out while new provincial programs are coming, they don't start until 2018, leaving many children in limbo for two years. Elaine also noted when those programs do arrive, they would not give many children the amount of therapy they need. She cited one child required 20-25 hours of IBI per week to move her from being non-verbal to partially verbal. "The new programs that are coming into ef- fect are not those hours. They are actually minimal hours and they are group settings," said Elaine. "They will not deal with the individual child's needs. They will only deal with it from a group setting." In addition to endorsing council's motion, Elaine and Athena called on councillors to provide Town staff at public facilities with training regarding autism so they will understand when a child has a public episode. Making public facilities sensory-friendly "I just want to make the public, and especially the staff, aware so they will be more supportive instead of giving judgmental looks," said Athena. They also asked the Town to consider establishing more programming for children with autism and other disabilities. "There are so few programs offered so these children sometimes never get a chance to experience summer camp or things that any typical child gets to enjoy, like team sports or things like that," said Elaine. Following the approval of the motion for the Province, Oakville Ward 5 councillors Jeff Knoll and Marc Grant called on Town staff to prepare a report that investigates training for staff on addressing the needs for people with autism. They also called on staff to look into making Town facilities "sensory-friendly" for people with autism wherever possible. parents in was made clear in a delegation by an Oakville parent who spoke about her four-yearold daughter, who lives with autism. After waiting three years, girl, 4, to be off list After three years on the waitlist for IBI the Oakville parent, who identified herself as Athena, said she recently received word from the Province her daughter was being taken off that list because of her age. The lone parent of two said the IBI would help her daughter with things many people take for granted like learning how to speak, how to eat properly, how to put on her clothes, how to follow instructions and how to cope with change. 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