'This has become an alarming crisis': Windsor-Essex Children’s Aid Society renting a house for surrendered youth

The Windsor-Essex Children’s Aid Society (CAS) is renting a house to help care for children and teens with complex mental health issues who have been surrendered by their parents.

Officials say a lack of access to mental health supports for youth is part of a province-wide mental health crisis in young people that’s growing more severe each day.

“This has become an alarming crisis,” stated Windsor-Essex CAS Executive Director Derrick Drouillard.

“We have in our community, and really across the province, a crisis that we're facing,” said Drouillard. “And that crisis is children and youth with complex special needs not having access to the services, programs, supports and placements that they need in order to become the best version of themselves to reach their potential.”

Drouillard said the number of local youth being voluntarily surrendered fluctuates and that the child welfare agency is utilizing unlicensed hotel rooms, the Windsor-Essex CAS office, and now a rented house to try and alleviate the problem, while also transferring youth to other communities to compete for services. Some as far away as Ottawa.

“It's not the fault of these youth,” Drouillard explained. “But this is how their sort of executive functioning translates and so these parents are turning to Children's Aid saying, ‘We need help,’ and ‘We need you to take our children into care,’ and I think they do that out of the hope that we have some pathway to access things to help their children.”

“The sad reality is we just don't. We’re a child protection system and not a children's mental health complex needs system,” said Drouillard. “We're not providing the wraparound services and intense programs that they need. And I'm talking about an actually relatively small subset of children and youth with these complex needs and various challenges that they're facing.”

Drouillard said there needs to be a whole government approach and some investments into this particular subset, “We hear from the government Ministry of Health investments they've made in mental health. Those are great, that's nice. This is not unfortunately impacting positively or at all this subset of children and youth that I'm describing.”

Drouillard said, “It's making those investments now because the cost of bringing a child into care and having a back end reactionary response from a cost perspective is 10 times more expensive, but from an outcome perspective is so much more damaging for children and youth.”

Windsor West MPP Lisa Gretzky, who is also the official Opposition critic for Mental Health and Addictions, defines the situation as horrific.

Gretzky suggested things are getting worse, telling CTV News more needs to be done to address the province-wide problem while bringing services and programs permanently into Windsor.

“There’s six children in range from five to 14. Most of them are 5, 6, 7 year olds and are in unlicensed placements, hotel rooms, under the care of CAS while they are desperately trying to find the type of mental health or developmental supports that these kids need,” said Gretzky. “No family should be put in a position where they feel they have to surrender their children.”

She continued, “With the right investments into mental health supports, child and youth mental health supports, with the right investments into developmental services, those children would get the help they need in community. Those parents would get the support that they need and some training that they need in order to be able to assist their children with some of their behaviors. And those kids can stay at home in their own communities.”

“We're not talking about them needing a phone line to be able to call when they're in crisis. That's not going to work for these kids. We're not talking about them being able to walk into an agency and get service that day as a one-off. That's not going to help these kids in these families,” said Gretzky. “We're talking about ensuring that we have the trained professionals here in our community that these parents and these kids have access to immediately when they need it. And that these kids are getting the treatment and the therapy and the supports that they need on an ongoing basis.”

“This is not a CAS problem. This is not the CAS not doing what they're supposed to do [for] these children. Their job is to provide protective services for children that are at risk. Whether that is from family members or other issues.”

“This is not a protection issue. This is the children not getting the supports and services they need,” Gretzky added. “CAS should not be taking these children and then they don't want to be but they know these families have nowhere else to turn at this point.”

In an email to CTV News, the Ontario Ministry of Health said its Roadmap to Wellness was helping children and youth, “Our government is improving mental health supports for children and youth through the Roadmap to Wellness, our $3.8 billion investment over 10 years to build a modern, world-class mental health and addictions system in every corner of the province.”

The ministry said through the Roadmap to Wellness, the government has flowed $525 million in new base funding for MHA services and supports since 2019-20, including:

• $130 million for child and youth mental health (CYMH) to improve access to specialized mental health treatment, reduce waitlists and wait times, expand existing programs, and create new programs to help manage stress, depression and anxiety. These investments form part of the $485 million the government allocates every year towards providing community-based child and youth mental health service across Ontario
• More than $9.05 million for Youth Wellness Hubs Ontario to support the creation of 14 youth wellness hubs, integrated youth service delivery sites that offer primary care, addictions and mental health services and supports in a youth-friendly service setting
• $2.9 million to enhance and expand the Substance Abuse Program for African and Caribbean Canadian Youth (SAPACCY) where black youth under the age of 25 can access a wide range of culturally safe mental health and addictions services and supports
• $16.6 million for eating disorders services and supports, including services for child and youth

The province said it’s investing $44.6 million to expand access to pediatric mental health services across the province, which will increase access to community-based intensive services for children and youth with complex mental health needs. They said they will also add 10 complex care beds, including in London, and add 2,200 clinical training spots at Children’s Mental Health Ontario (CMHO) to train clinicians who treat to children and youth with complex service needs across the province.

The ministry noted the 2023/24 budget also includes a 5 per cent increase in base funding for all community based mental health and addiction organizations, however it did not specify if any programs or services would be coming to Windsor.