Francine Bastien

The Brome Lake Local Community Service Centre (CLSC) was supposed to reopen on September 9 after a summer closure. Authorities at the Centre intégré universitaire de santé et des services sociaux (CIUSSS) de l’Estrie justified this closure by the lack of personnel. In September, on the Quebec government’s Clic Santé web portal for making appointments for different tests, the Lac-Brome site did not appear, making it impossible to make an appointment there.

During the summer, the CIUSSS cancelled the lease for the CLSC premises at the Lac-Brome Centre. An indication of the CIUSSS’s intentions? When Town of Brome Lake Councillor Lee Patterson asked the CIUSSS to clarify its intentions, he was told that the CLSC was going to reopen, then a little later, it was no longer known whether it was going to open or not. “The CIUSSS underestimates how attached the population is to its local services,” says Lee Patterson, who closely monitors the situation, moreover “the closure will have a major impact on the services provided in Sutton and Cowansville.”

On September 9, we learned from the Town that the reopening of the CLSC had been postponed until mid-October. In a release, the CIUSSS cites the shortage of labor and “the withdrawal of the possibility of using independent labor [staff from agencies].” Oddly enough, the shortage of labour does not affect the CLSC in Sutton or Bromont, only the one in Lac-Brome. As for the use of “agency staff ’ it must be understood that the receptionist at the Centre Lac-Brome gave a few hours of her time on the days the CLSC was open. This proved an innovative way of offering a public service to users without having to pay another receptionist for the CLSC. Associating this practice with the “use of agencies” is rather surprising.

Until mid-October – and perhaps beyond – citizens are asked to go to the CLSCs in Cowansville, Sutton or Bromont to receive the serv- ices previously offered at the CLSC Lac-Brome.

Councillor Patterson is circulating a petition to maintain CLSC services in Lac-Brome. It is available online at https:/knowlton.quebec/#section1.