After announcing his party’s new name on Wednesday, the leader of B.C.’s official opposition party was in Kelowna on Thursday.
Kevin Falcon of BC United had numerous meetings in the city. And in between those meetings, he visited a local children’s development centre slated for closure.
“The NDP are bound and determined to, you know, shut down locations like this, which have served so many generations of children so successfully,” Falcon told Global News. “And we’re really trying to stop that.”
Falcon’s visit to the Starbright Children’s Development Centre comes after centre staff extended an invitation to both the leader of the opposition and Premier David Eby to see firsthand what the facility is all about.
“We’re absolutely thrilled,” said Starbright executive director Rhonda Nelson. “We want him to see our facility, to have a walkabout, to listen to our board and our staff and the families.
“We’ve got families that have agreed to speak with him.”
The centre provides all kinds of therapies for children with developmental challenges from birth until school-entry age.
But after 57 years of service, the NDP government announced it was terminating the contract with Starbright as it centralizes services with a hub model, creating pilot Family Connections Centres (FCC) for all children up to the age of 18.
“If they want to do a pilot project, great do a pilot project. But you know, why would you do a pilot project and close down what’s working so that you can see if something else works? That makes no sense to me,” Falcon said.
“We’ve opposed it from Day 1. We think it’s the wrong direction. It’s clearly demonstrated in Ontario that has not worked for children. This idea that government knows best and you’re going to go to a government office and they’re going to tell you what services you need for your child is not the right approach.”
In Kelowna, the FCC contract was awarded to ARC Programs, a private company that sub-contracts services to other private companies and not-for-profit organizations.
News of the closure led to a public outcry by past and present parents who have come to depend on the services for their children, including a large protest held outside the facility in February.
The pushback put pressure on the government, which decided to extend Starbright’s contract by two years.
The contract is set to expire in March 2025.
It means the centre and the families who depend on the services will once again be faced with uncertainty around future services and how those will be delivered to children.
“The future is very unknown for them,” Nelson said. “They want to know that services, such as the ones Starbright provides, will be there for them.”
Nelson hopes that if the government proceeds with the FCC model, it will at least include Starbright by allowing the centre to continue offering services to children and letting the new model support youth, school-entry age and up.
“That’s what we have proposed over and over again, a potential solution that would honour what they have put in place for older youth, but also keep what currently exists,” Nelson said.
And while Falcon is not the decision maker, he said he will continue advocating for Starbright and other centres facing the same fate.
“Our voice matters. Working with parents with autistic children, we managed to get the government to pause their stripping away individualized funding,” Falcon said.
“That was another thing that they were trying to do, and it was only because parents standing up with one voice along with the opposition to say ‘No, you can’t do that. You will hurt kids.'”
As for the premier’s invite, Eby has not yet committed to a visit, but Nelson said the offer remains open.
“Most definitely it is,” Nelson said. “We would love to have him come and actually see us.”
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