A $36 million class-action lawsuit agreement has been approved by the Superior Court of Justice that will compensate former residents of developmental services facilities across the province and in southern Ontario.
The money would be used to provide compensation to former residents who "suffered harm" while living at the insitutions.
The institutions involved in the tentative agreement are: Adult Occupational Centre (Edgar), Bluewater Centre (Goderich), D'Arcy Place (Cobourg), Durham Centre for the Developmentally Handicapped (Whitby), L.S. Penrose Centre (Kingston), Midwestern Regional Centre (Palmerston), Muskoka Centre (Gravenhurst), Northwestern Regional Centre (Thunder Bay), Oxford Mental Health Centre (Woodstock), Oxford Regional Centre (Woodstock), Pine Ridge Centre (Aurora), Prince Edward Heights (Picton), St. Lawrence Regional Centre (Brockville).
Those facilities were shut down by the province between 1977 and 1999.
A pair of similar class actions were also settled by the province almost three years ago.
A $35-million settlement in case of residents at the Huronia Regional Centre in Orillia was reached in September 2013 and approved by a court in December of that year.
A $32.7-million settlement involving former residents of the Rideau Regional Centre in Smiths Falls and the Southwestern Regional Centre near Chatham was reached in December 2013 and approved in February 2014.
The Huronia settlement led Premier Kathleen Wynne to apologize in the Ontario legislature for the suffering residents experienced there.
