More than 100 children’s mental health workers across Niagara region could be locked out by their employer, Pathstone Mental Health, as early as February 22, 2025.
Join our information pickets in St. Catharines and Welland on February 12!
Pathstone workers from OPSEU/SEFPO local 214 will be holding an information picket at two Pathstone locations to tell Pathstone management: Kids’ mental health is worth fighting for!
- Date: February 12, 2025
- Time: 12 noon
- Location #1: Intersection of Third Street Louth and Fourth Avenue, St. Catharines, next to the Branscombe Centre (click here for Google map)
- Location #2: Mountainview Centre for Innovative Learning, 1604 Merrittville Highway, Welland (click here for Google map)
Take action! Send an email to Pathstone CEO Shaun Baylis now.
Can’t make it to the info picket? You can support Pathstone workers from anywhere, anytime!
Click here to send an email to Pathstone CEO Shaun Baylis now!
Let him know that you support Pathstone workers, and that children’s mental health is worth fighting for!
Timeline of stonewalling by Pathstone management:
- December 2024: 95% of the Pathstone’s children’s mental health workers voted to reject a forced “final offer” from management that was filled with concessions, including benefit cuts, wages that fell below inflation, and attacks on sick leave. (In contrast, Pathstone’s CEO, Shaun Baylis, got a $28,000 raise in 2023 alone, which works out to a 15% raise in one year!)
- Throughout January 2025: Pathstone management refused repeated requests by the union to come back to the bargaining table unless the workers would agree in advance to pay huge out-of-pocket premiums for their benefits. That’s not how bargaining works.
- February 2025: Instead of bargaining without preconditions, Pathstone management filed for a No Board from the Ministry of Labour, starting the countdown to a potential lockout.
- February 22, 2025: Earliest date that Pathstone management can lock out children’s mental health workers across Niagara region.
What’s at stake
Pathstone Mental Health is the lead agency for children’s mental health in Niagara Region. OPSEU/SEFPO members staff a co-ed live-in treatment home, walk-in clinics across the region for youth experiencing mental health crises, a crisis support line, one-on-one and group therapy, outreach and family support services, and behavioural supports in primary and secondary academic programs.
Pathstone Mental Health workers represented by OPSEU/SEFPO Local 214 include counsellors, registered social worker therapists (MSWs and BSWs), registered psychotherapists, outreach workers, registered early childhood educators, group home workers and house parents, family support workers, and administrative staff.
These are the children’s mental services Pathstone management is putting at risk with their lockout threat. Kids’ mental health is worth fighting for!