New @ OPL

This week's new addition is a publication from the Canadian Institute for Health Information entitled Mentally Healthy Communities: A Collection of Papers. This report consists of several short, readable opinion-oriented pieces answering the questions What are mentally healthy communities, and; what makes some communities more mentally healthy or resilient than others?

This collection will be followed by a supplement addressing mentally healthy communities from an Aboriginal perspective, which is on order and should arrive soon.

New Government Resource

The Government of Ontario has released a preliminary 10-Year mental health and addictions strategy. This paper, entitled Every Door is the Right Door, is an indepth examination of mental illness and addiction treatments and services in Ontario, with a focus on developing a plan to improve existing services and supports. This publication is an excellent resource for those interested in both the occurence of Mental Illness and Addiction problems in Ontario, as well as information about possible services.

H1N1 Resources

Looking for information about H1N1? Check out the Government of Canada's Fightflu.ca site. A great source for up-to-date information about symptoms, the H1N1 vaccine, and flu protection.

Want more local information? Try Ontario's Ministry of Health and Long-term Care flu site.

More New Materials!

This week business and economic issues abound!

Canada's Economic Action Plan: A Guide to Benefits and Programs is now available. This guide is a companion to the previously issued Economic Action Plan, outlined in Budget 2009.

Foreign Affairs and International Trade Canada has also released an update on Canada's State of Trade. An excellent summary of Canada's economic status and trade activities, this publication also includes a special feature on Canada's performance in emerging markets.

On a slightly more business oriented note, Human Resources and Skills Development Canada has released an updated Guide to Planning Inclusive Meetings. With the introduction of the Accessibility Standards in Ontario, this resource is an extremely valuable tool for anyone responsible for coordinating and organizing meetings in almost any setting.

New Government Documents at OPL

It been a while but we have several new government publications in OPL’s collection, ready for Fall reading.

Healthy Canadians: A Federal Report on Comparable Health Indicators 2008

This report from Health Canada offers current information on, and analysis of the performance of Canada’s Health Care System, and the health of its citizens. It focuses primarily on the status of the general Canadian population, with some extra attention paid to the health of the First Nations and Inuit communities of this nation. In addition, Statistics Canada and the Canadian Institute for Health Information have just released Health Indicators 2009, another useful source of comparative data.

With Our Best Future in Mind: Implementing Early Learning in Ontario

Just in time for back to school, we now have a print copy of Charles Pascal’s report on early childhood education.

For those interested in environmental and energy issues in Ontario and Canada, we have several new publications just for you.

Interim Report on Ontario’s Biodiversity 2008 and;

The Solar Task Force Report from Ontario’s Ministry of Energy and Infrastructure.

Canadian Energy Overview 2008

Government documents recently added to OPL's collection

Report of the propane safety review
(Report by independent panel prior to the August 2008 explosion in north Toronto)
Society at a glance 2009: OECD Social indicators
Organisation for Economic Co-operation & development biennial report that attempts to satisfy the demand for quantitative data on social well-being and trends. It compares facts and figures across countries, using a wide range of indicators, some more unexpected than others - time spent watching television, on personal care, leisure patterns by age. There are also many health indicators, poverty and education indicators, crime, bullying and suicide indicators.
Up against a wall. Coping with becoming a teen when you have been maltreated as a child
Substance use among adolescents in child welfare versus adolescents in the general population
Places to Grow: Size and location of urban growth centres in the Greater Golden Horseshoe
This report outlines the relevant policies in the Growth Plan for the Greater Golden Horseshoe, which relate to urban growth centres and provides maps depicting the size and location of the 25 urban growth centres in the GGH.
Immigrants in rural Canada: 2006
Examines immigration patterns in Canada's rural and small towns
2009 Hunting Regulations Summary
From Government of Ontario - if you plan to hunt small game, wolves, moose, wild turkeys, black bear or deer, you need to know the regulations that apply.

Health Care Options Ontario

The Health Care Options website from the Ontario Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care aims to connect Ontario residents quickly with the local health care they need.
It provides contact information, including names, addresses and hours of operation, for frontline health care services in your community, and includes descriptions and links to Telehealth Ontario (call to get health advice from a registered nurse (helps you find family health care in your community), Healthcare Connect (helps you to find health care in your community), Community Care Access Centres (access to government-funded homes and community services and long-term care, Connex (alcohol, gambling and mental health services). Factsheets in over 20 different languages can be printed off from the website.
For analysis of the health care systems in the U.S. and Canada, see the report One Issue, Two Voices: Health Care in Crisis. The Drive for Health Reform in Canada and the United States

New government resources at Oakville Public Library

The following electronic resources have been added:
Finding home: Policy options for addressing homelessness in Canada
Finding Home aims to fill a gap in the information available on homelessness by providing an easily accessible collection of some of the best Canadian research and policy analysis on homelessness. This e-book includes summaries of recently completed research reports as well as the most policy-relevant published articles from scholarly journals. The chapters have been edited to keep them at a length of 3,000 to 9,000 words and to ensure that they are accessible to a non-specialist audience. Each chapter is a separate dowloadable PDF.

Opening doors to the world: Canada's international market access priorities

Lessons to be learned : The report of the Honourable Bob Rae, Independent Advisor to the Minister of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness, on outstanding questions with respect to the bombing of Air India flight 182

The community solution to gang violence - a collaborative community process and evaluation framework

With our best future in mind; Implementing early learning in Ontario

Children and lone-mother families

Recognition of the foreign credentials of immigrants

Canadian housing observer 2008: with a feature on housing need

Guide to Canadian Heritage financial support programs

Income in Canada

Abortion in Canada

Energy efficiency trends in Canada 1990 to 2005

Energy Consumption of major household appliances shipped in Canada

Health in Canada

Statistics Canada has just introduced a new module available from its home page. Called Health in Canada the module features the most up-to-date statistics on the health of Canadians and the health care system.
Scroll down the page and view the sections: Health Indicators (data about a topic), Health Reports (articles on a topic), Health Subtopics (information by theme) and Health Profile, which features community-level data from a number of sources, including Statistics Canada's health surveys, administrative data, and the Census of population.
The application provides the latest statistics available for a selected health region (e.g. Oakville), provides the corresponding provincial data by default, and users can easily select any region of choice for comparison.

Use this information to:

• Find the latest health statistics available from a wide range of indicators for a specific region
• Quickly compare with provincial or national rates, other jurisdictions, peer groups, etc.
• Profile the overall health of a community.
• Toggle to census Community profile data for the same area.

Ontario government report on early education

This 68-page report, published yesterday, is available from the Ministry of Education's website With our best future in mind: Implementing early learning in Ontario.
There will be a link in Bibliocommons to the PDF, and the print copy will be added as soon as it is available for ordering.

Virtual Reference Service - U.S. Government Information Online

GIO (Government Information Online)is a free online information service supported by nearly twenty public, state and academic libraries throughout the United States. Through Chat and e-mail users are directed to information from U.S.. government agencies, in particular federal, but state, regional and local agancies as well. The libraries involved are federal depositories.

Funding for Town of Oakville from Ontario and Federal governments

A total of $3.4 billion in federal funding has been granted to municipalities in Ontario for investment in infrastructure projects. These funds will be matched by the Ontario government and the municipal governments themselves.
The Town of Oakville has received $30 million in infrastructure stimulus funds - equally provided by the governments of Canada and Ontario - to build a new $45 million dollar transit facility (the remaining third to come from Town's capital funding). The new facility will be completed by March 31, 2011.
For an aerial view and site plan of the proposed facility, see the Town's website

NEW government resources at Oakville Public Library

Recently added to our collection:

Featured publication
The World Health Report 2008: Primary Health Care, Now more than ever. World Health Organization
This is a great resource for anyone researching or working in primary health care of health care policy.
Chapter headings :
Challenges of a changing world
Advancing and sustaining universal coverage
Primary care: putting people first
Public policies for the public's health
Leadership and effective government
The way forward

More additions to the collection :
On-line News Fundamentals: An introduction to journalism on CBCNews.ca
Discovering Ontario: A report on the future of tourism
Ontario Curriculum Grades 11 & 12 Science (updated 2008)
Divorce law in Canada
Improving the health of Canadians

Electronic resources:
Deaths 2006. Statistics Canada
Retail Trade :How the provinces fared in 2008
Manufacturing: the year 2008 in review
Immigrant Characteristics, the IT bust, and the effect on entry earnings of immigrants

Ontario's Green Energy Act

This new act, which came into force on May 14, porposes to ease the growhth ot clean, renewaable energy, including wind, solar, hydro, biomass and biogas. It will help to get energy projects up and running more quickly by removing barriers and providing added reliability.

Kevin Flynn, MPP for Oakville and Parliamentary Assistant to the Minister of the Environment, was at Oakville Town Hall last week to talk about the act. Key components are:
· Streamlining the approvals process for renewable energy projects
· Mandatory (unless waived by buyer) home energy audits prior to sale of homes
· Developing a Feed-in tariff system to provide guaranteed prices for renewable energy projects
· Opportunities for communities to build, own, and operate their own renewable energy projects
· New programs to ensure some costs of community renewable energy projects can be recovered

To learn more about the act, go to http://www.ontariogreenenergyact.ca/ The fulltext of the act can be found at http://www.ontla.on.ca/bills/bills-files/39_Parliament/Session1/b150.pdf

Ontario legislation in the news

There are several Bills of interest passing through the Ontario legislature at the moment and these are getting quite a bit of coverage in the press. It's interesting to track them as they go through the various stages to becoming law and interesting to see the wide array of Bills under discussion. It's simple to do this. Go to Bills and Lawmaking at the Ontario Legislature website to see a list of all Bills currently before Parliament. These can be sorted by Bill number or by Title.
Here are some examples of legislation that has recently received a lot of attention:
Bill 118, Countering Distracted Driving and Promoting green Transportation Act. This Bill, which received Royal Assent on 23 April is the new legislation covering the use of cell phones and other hand-held devices while driving.

Bill 163, Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area Transit Implementation Act, 2009 - from here you can read the full text of the bill, view the status of the bill (it received Royal Assent on 14 May), read the debates about the bill, find out what it is about and see what Acts are affected by it.

Bill 173, Mining Amendment Act - proposed changes related to prospecting land, staking claims etc.

Bill 150, Green Energy and Green Economy Act,

Bill 128, Christopher's Statute Law Amendment Act (Sex OffenderRegistry and Electronic Sexual Material) - this bill seeks to ensure that library and school boards block access to certain materials on their computers for people under the age of 18. It has not gone beyond First Reading.

Ontario Government, Summer Job Program

The 2009 Ontario Budget increased funding for the Ontario summer job program by over 57 per cent or $32 million, to help more students find summer work in their communities. Students can apply for a variety of government jobs or for funding to start their own business. Employers may be eligible for a $2 per hour wage subsidy to encourage them to hire summer students. Different types of employment are available. Age range is 15 to 30.
Call Employment Ontario at 1-800-387-5656 or visitwww.ontario.ca/summerjobs to find out more about summer job opportunities.

Alcohol statistics: control and sale

Never say Statistics Canada is dry!
Market share for beer declined over last year, though beer is still by far the most popular alcoholic drink. Wine sales showed an increase, particularly sales of red wine. Dollar sales of red wine have more than doubled since 2000. For more interesting facts see The Daily

Government rebates for homeowners

Both the Ontario government and the federal government are offering a dizzying array of rebates to homeowners to help spur economic activity and encourage energy savings.
Here are some of the rebates offered. If you know of any others, please blog it.
From the federal government the EcoEnergy retrofit website gives a list of available federal rebates.
(NRCan-certified home energy audit required)
See Grant Table for list of qualifying Eco-Energy retrofits, including $1,250 Homes rebate for solar domestic hot water systems (a dramatic increase from the previous $500)

Ontario Home Energy Savings Program rebate
Current value$500 (but details are being finalized to match ecoENERGY rebate)

Home Energy Audit Program Rebate
$150 toward the cost of an NRCan-certified home energy audit
To qualify for rebates offered through the ecoENERGY Retrofit – Homes program and the Ontario Home Energy Savings Program, an NRCan-certified energy advisor must conduct an energy audit in your home and provide you with a checklist of recommended retrofits. Once the energy advisor has visited your home, you have 18 months (or until March 31, 2011, whichever comes first and subject to available funding) to complete any recommended retrofits and get a post-retrofit evaluation. You will receive a cheque within 90 days of your post-retrofit assessment. The cost of an NRCan-certified audit is approximately $350 for a pre-retrofit inspection and $150 for a post-retrofit inspection

Homeowners can qualify next tax season for the Home Renovation Tax Credit, which amounts to getting 15 per cent back from the cost of a home renovation in 2009, up to a maximum of $1,350.

Available until Jan 1, 2010 through Ontario Ministry of Revenue is the Retail Sales Tax rebate (Solar Energy Systems Rebate Program)

Feed-in Tariff (pending approval)
Get paid $0.802 per kWh that you produce throughout a 20-year contract
If approved, this tariff will be available through the Ontario Power Authority

Net Metering (Available through your local utility)
Pay the current rate for the energy you use minus the energy you produce.

In Ontario, most EnergyStar appliances are also exempt from retail sales tax until Sept. 1, 2009. http://www.rev.gov.on.ca/english/notices/rst/68.html

New government publications added at Oakville Public Library

Publications recently received from the government and government agencies:
Review of the Roots of Youth Violence
Halton Region's strategy to become more inclusive to diverse communities 2009-2011
Diversity in Action: A toolkit for residential settings for seniors
Safe Boating Guide 2009
Canada's Electoral Process
Services for Seniors Guide (Large Print)
Ontario's Energy Efficiency Resource & Funding Guide
Step by step guide to exporting
Third Generation Public Libraries: Visionary Thinking and Service Development in Public Libraries (To 2020) and Potential Application in Ontario : Report for the Ontario Minister of Culture
A vision for children in Halton: Report Card 2008 (Our Kids Network)
A Fine Balance: Safe Pensions, Affordable Plans, Fair Rules: Report of the Expert Commission on Pensions

Plastic bags

Library of Parliament produces excellent reports on a wide range of topics. A recent 9-pager "Plastic Bags: Reducing their use through regulation and other initiatives" gives the Canadian perspective on ridding our lives of this consumer item.

Pesticide Ban - new provincial law

New legislation from the Ontario Government the Cosmetic Pesticide Ban Act will take the place of existing municipal pesticide by-laws (in the case of Oakville, it is the Pesticide By-Law 2007-123). This new legislation updates the existing Pesticides Act and Ontario Regulation 63/09 and comes into force on April 22. Read more about it on the website of the Ministry of the Environment. This includes regulatory requirements for retailers and the landscape industry as well as rules for golf courses, agriculture and forestry.

Health and medical information in Ontario

Consumer Health Information Service (CHIS) at the Toronto Public Library provides access to a wealth of health and medical information for Ontarians. Located on the 3rd. floor of the Toronto Reference Library, CHIS is funded by the Ontario Ministry of Health Promotion. The website provides details of walk-in and telephone services and a list of resources. Check out the Health Guides on a wide range of topics and the CHIS Blog (see link "More Gov Blogs" on the sidebar)
Another excellent source, this time from the Ontario Ministry of Health and Long-term Care is the Medical Services Directory. Enter your postal code to bring up a list of Walk-in clinics, Health Care Providers, Emergency Rooms etc. in your area.

Volunteer Tax Preparation Clinics Oakville

Volunteer Tax Preparation Clinics are being held at various locations in Oakville, including the White Oaks Branch Library during March and April. Dates, times and locations are listed.
Canada Revenue Agency offers training to volunteers who can help you complete your income tax and benefit return if your income is low and your tax situation is simple.
Volunteers do not complete income tax and benefit returns for deceased persons, bankrupt individuals, or individuals who have capital gains or losses, employment expenses, or business or rental income and expenses.

Government publications - New at Oakville Public Library

Recently added:
Action on the Ground II: Working with Canadians to improve ecological integrity in Canada's national Parks
Homebuying step by step: A Consumer Guide and Workbook
Reaching out: Innovation in Canadian Libraries
Health Care in Canada
Annual Report to Parliament on Immigration
Services for Seniors Guide: A guide to Government of Canada services for seniors and their families
Science, Discovery and Innovation for Canadians

2011 Census Statistics Canada

Statistics Canada has created an online discussion forum to facilitate the exchange of comments between census and geography data users in order to explore and gather ideas and suggestions for the 2011 Census dissemination strategy. Any member of the public may post suggestions there regarding format and content of future census products.

Salmonella contamination - Peanut products in Canada

From the CFIA website today. The list of products is extensive, with some unexpected additions. Take a look.

"As a result of the ongoing investigation in the United States, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA), working in close collaboration with the United States Food and Drug Administration, has identified potentially affected foods present in Canada.
Canadians are urged to check the complete list of products in Canada that contain peanut butter and / or peanut paste recalled recently in the U.S. by Peanut Corporation of America. This list will be updated as additional products distributed in Canada are identified."

Government publications - NEW at Oakville Public Library

Inquiry into Pediatric Forensic Pathology in Ontario (Goudge Report)
Welfare Incomes 2006/7

From Town of Oakville
State of the Environment
.Indicators for the Oakville Environmental Strategic Plan
Let's go green together

Buying your first home in Canada: What Newcomers Need to Know (Canadian Mortgage and Housing Corporation)
Community Lens (Community Development Halton)

Throne Speech and Budget

We can't compete with last week's events in the U.S. government but there is a lot happening this week in the Canadian Parliament. The Governor General opens the 2nd Session of the 40th Parliament today with the Speech from the Throne. The text of the Throne Speech will be available in the Senate and House of Commons Debates for January 26, 2009. The Debates will be posted on the Parliament of Canada web site on January 27 and can be found under Chamber Business.
Minister of Finance Jim Flaherty will table the 2009 budget in the House of Commons on Tuesday, January 27, 2009, at approximately 4:00 p.m.
Click ParlVU to view live webcasts.

e-Laws official status

There has been a recent change regarding the Government of Ontario's e-Laws. As of Nov 30, 2008, laws printed from the e-Laws website are now considered the official version and can be used in court. See the e-Laws website "What is considered to be an official copy of a source law or consolidated law?" for more information. However, for federal legislation, the Consolidated acts and regulations on the Department of Justice website still do not have official sanction. As indicated on the website, they are "provided to the public for convenience and readability only".

Savings accounts: choosing the right savings account for your needs

From the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada, the Savings Report is a 30-page document with information to help the consumer get the best savings account. The report includes very useful tables for anyone wishing to shop around: Table 1 compares accounts from different financial institutions, under the headings Interest, features available, account accessibility, and record keeping options. Table 2 compares accounts by service fees charged - In-branch, ATM, Internet.

Tips for winter driving in Ontario

The Ontario Ministry of Transportation has some good tips if you are driving in snowy or icy conditions. Learn what to do if you encounter a snow plow, why you should not pass it on the right, what you should carry in your car as a survival kit, and generally how to be road-ready and weather-wise.