Winnipeg's Transit Plus under review amid OT staffing shortage

The City of Winnipeg is putting a service that provides door-to-door rides to people living with disabilities under review.

Winnipeg Transit Plus is meant to help people, who have disabilities that prevent them from taking a city bus, travel around the city.

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It's a door-to-door ride-share service that some say is not living up to its mandate

"It was our consumers and members who said, ‘Hey, why are we waiting so long for this?” said David Kron, executive director of the Cerebral Palsy Association of Manitoba.

A group of six support organizations say a city staffing shortage of occupational therapists has led to a backlog of more than 100 people waiting for Transit Plus accommodation assessments.

The assessments done by Transit Plus OTs approve eligibility or confirm special requests like the use of a different type of vehicle.

"Accommodations that are supposed to be protected based upon human rights. Accommodations that are maybe threatening not just their access to the system, but their safety, their ability to earn an income, their ability to attend their health care appointments,” said Patrick Stewart with the Independent Living Resource Centre.

A Winnipeg Transit spokesperson tells CTV News Winnipeg that Transit Plus had five occupational therapists leave in the past year.

"We have quickly contracted services to ensure we can complete eligibility assessments for our customers in a timely manner,” the spokesperson said.

This week, the group of community organizations asked the executive policy committee for an external review of why these Transit Plus therapists left, and why it's taken so long to update Transit Plus' eligibility policy.

On Wednesday, it was decided the city's interim chief administrative officer will take on the issue.

“The goal is to make sure that people have access to Transit Plus when they need it,” said Mayor Scott Gillingham.

“And so, we always want to be able to reduce the timelines and improve the service that people rely upon.”

Kron said he hopes the CAO review will demand good answers for Winnipeggers who depend on the service .

"I am hopeful they are going to do it with us and not to us,” he said.

We don't know yet how long the CAO review will take, but Kron said the organizations that brought this issue up have been contacted to set up a meeting with city officials.

Winnipeg Transit says Transit Plus has approximately 25 remaining accommodation inquiry cases at last check.

It says it will be revisiting its delivery model as it reviews eligibility for Transit Plus now that it has launched a new booking system.