A new poll by Environics Research group, commissioned by CUPE, says 86 percent of those surveyed feel that nursing homes should be publicly operated.
The poll surveyed 814 residents in North Bay and surrounding municipalities by automated telephone on May 18 and 19th.
The poll comes as the union fights what it calls, "discussions taking place that would change the nursing home [Cassellholme] to a private, independent facility."
See related story: Cassellholme looks at new model for long term care.
The same poll indicates 87 percent want the mayor and council to vote to keep Cassellholme public and almost six out of 10 woul be less likely to vote for their mayor or councillor if they vote to make Cassellholme private.
"We know that municipal homes in Timmins, Sudbury and throughout Northern Ontario are being fed the same line the Cassellholme board was fed by consulting firm KPMG whose interest is to tell municipalities that the best way for them to move forward is to divest of the services that they've run for generations," CUPE president Fred Hahn told a news conference this morning.
"We know that folks in Timmins and in Sudbury and in Thunder Bay are all watching what will happen here in North Bay. So this is incredibly important to the people of this community, no question, but it is also important to the people of Northern Ontario."
Derek Leebosh, VP of public affairs for Environics, told BayToday that, "We basically loaded all of the phone numbers from North Bay and surrounding area of East Nipissing and people were just ramdonly dialed."
Lebosh says his poll is accurate within plus or minus 3.4 percent.
