OLTCA campaign for long-term care takes on new look
Effort hopes to dovetail with government consultative process
Friday March 19, 2004 Roderick Benns
A "completely different" approach to championing the long-term care sector has been taken by the Ontario Long Term Care Association (OLTCA) this year, one the organization hopes will yield an impressive return in government attention.

Karen Sullivan, executive director of OLTCA, tells Morning Report the new consultative approach this year actually mirrors the new Ontario government’s approach to business.

"Rather than say ‘here, sign a card please’ and then mail them in, this approach provides for the opportunity for solid information, both for us and the government," say Sullivan.

Sullivan refers to the way things have been done in the past two years by OLTCA, in what has become an annual campaign to draw attention to the long-term care sector. In the previous two years, individuals connected with the sector (or any concerned citizen) would simply sign a post card of support that asked the provincial government for more long-term care dollars.

This year, a simple online poll found on the front page of www.oltca.com, or actual cards and ballot boxes found in all member homes, asks participants to choose their top five priorities for the sector, in order of preference. There are choices like ‘more staff to reduce the time to respond to resident needs,’ ‘more education and training for staff,’ and ‘more funding for care and services,’ among many others.

"There is lots of attention focused on long-term care right now, as a result of increased media attention," says Sullivan.

She says this new approach builds on the attention, and does this in an on-the-ground, populist way.

"This is a grassroots approach and it dovetails with the Liberal’s consultative approach. We took the notion of the top five priorities and the provincial government’s broader strategy of participation and combined the two," says Sullivan.

Sullivan says they have also built credibility into the process by ensuring ballot boxes will not be opened before the end of the campaign and that the online component will only allow a voter to vote once.

Once the feedback is in, the executive director says the information will be reported centrally, to the Province. But she says it will be important to get the results out locally, too, to individual members of provincial parliament.

"We’re expecting (the selected ballot priorities) to be a mix of accountability issues and funding issues," says Sullivan.

The campaign runs until April 16.