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The union representing 17 workers effected by the closure of municipal-run child care by the end of the year is looking into legal action against the city.
Ray Lindquist, president of CUPE Local 191 representing the four full-time and 13 part-time and casual workers effected by the city's decision, said the national Canadian Union of Public Employees office is looking into filing an injunction to sort out disputed financial numbers.
"The numbers that they provided are totally wrong," he said. "We weren't asking them (Monday) to vote it down, what we wanted them to do was slow this process down. Let's make sure that the numbers are correct. I think it's only fair to day-care staff and the citizens of Kenora that everybody knows what the numbers are."
Lindquist said the union's request to see the pertinent financial reports wasn't met by city staff.
"I'm not going to accuse anybody of cooking the books," he said, "but did they definitely twist those numbers to make it look like the day care was losing money? I'm going to say yes."
While council initially cited a projected deficit of more than $50,000 from city run child care, city administrative officer Karen Brown admitted in an e-mail Tuesday her early numbers didn't include revenues from the city's summer camp program, which was created in 2004 to offset the losses from the day care.
Adjusted to include $37, 062 of stabilization funding from the Kenora District Services Board announced last week, the city's combined child care programs - day care, before and after school and summer camp programs - are projected to run a $15,195 loss for 2012, which is down from an estimated loss of $52,257 earlier in the year, said Brown.
Carole Burunneau, vice-president of CUPE Local 191, disputed council's claims the program has been running a regular deficit, saying it has actually run on a surplus since 2009 and said a pay equity influx tacked onto the 2011 budget isn't representative of the programs' general operations.
Brown acknowledged a $78,253 settlement retroactive three years to 2009 was appropriated from the city's contingency reserves and appeared on the 2011 budget because the previous years' numbers were already closed. Adjusted to reflect the pay equity settlement, the combined program ran a $19,333 surplus in 2009, a $606 deficit in 2010 and a $1,453 loss in 2011, according to Brown.
The union expects to hear back from its legal team this week what action will be taken.
-reprinted from Kenora Daily Miner & News