Belleville approves $250K one-time Belleville Family Physician Appreciation Fund (FPAF)

NOTE: Healthcare is not a municipal responsibility, it is a provincial responsibility. If you cannot find a doctor, contact your Member of Provincial Parliament (MPP) and the Premier of Ontario Doug Ford and demand that more doctors are added to the healthcare system.

$250,000 has been committed to the Family Physician Appreciation Fund (FPAF) in the 2025 Operating Budget, funded by the Casino – Disaster/Contingency Reserve Fund.

A $250,000 budget commitment won’t allow the City to provide all physicians with a $10,000 grant (with 45 doctors), as there simply isn’t enough funding available. However this program will allow the City to provide a grant to a significant number of doctors, with a focus on a return on investment through increased patient load/uptake.

Eligibility

It is an application-based fund following the same structure as the Municipal Grant programs. Upon approval, the grant policy and guidelines will be updated to include this program, including the following eligibility and evaluation criteria for accessing the funding:

• Applicants must be a fully licensed family physician operating in Belleville with a roster of at least 500 existing patients
• Priority will be given to applicants that apply for funding to increase their roster of patients and the applicant must provide proof that they have taken these patients from the Health Care Connect service
• Applicants may apply for funding to support investments in new equipment, software, training, onboarding additional staff, the implementation of benefit plans for staff and any other items that the City considers reasonable investments in established medical clinics
• Applicants may only apply once per year for the fund and the maximum funding amount will be $10,000 per physician per year.
  • $10,000 will be available for doctors adding to their roster at the rate of $100/patient.
  • Up to $5,000 per year will be available to physicians for other investments such as new equipment, software, training, onboarding staff, benefits, etc.
• Family physicians that are currently under a recruitment contract with the City will not be eligible for the incentive that would increase their roster of patients as they are in the process of building their roster, but they would be eligible for funding which would help them purchase equipment, train staff, etc.

Staff recommended that funding be one-time so that Belleville isn’t on the hook to continue paying if health care system improves

Heath care is not a municipal responsibility and it would not be in the best interest of Belleville tax payers to implement a program that cannot be scaled back once the Province makes improvements to the practice
and compensation models for family physicians.

It may be important to note that Dr. Jane Philpott has been tasked by the current government to develop new models and policies which are to improve the health care system in Ontario. If appropriate changes are made, the FPAF may no longer be needed. However, these changes will take time to be implemented and this fund can be reevaluated annually until the current issues have been addressed.