The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

and more companies are shutting down permanently, the number of unemployâ€" ment insurance claimants rises, and subseâ€" quently the number of general welfare assistance caseloads rises in the same fashion." Deborah Crandall Chronicle Staff The number of welfare cases handled by the region‘s social services department has skyrocketed by more than 60 per cent over the last year. And the worst may be yet to come. As of the end of last November, the region was handling 9,160 general welfare assistance cases. At the same tme period last year, the region was handling 5,707 welfare cases. Beth Blowes, social planning and admiâ€" nistrative coâ€"ordinator mnwl;g Waterloo Region‘s social services department, said the poor economy is the obvious cause of skyrocketing wolfu; statistics, :’il:.:lan increasing number of permanent j lost being the key factor. ‘The general welfare assistance caseload very much mirrors the unemployment activity across the country, the province and the region," Blowes said. "So as more Welfare caseload increases 60% in region Chronicle HWipearinimgpvweeir y use Break‘s over as Hawks prepare for the road Page 25 Because the region has experienced several plant closing or partial closings in the past year, more people have been Canine companions brighten lives of Parkwoods seniors 8. 199 Waterloo. Ont: Page 5 forced to receive unemployment insurance benefits. When those benefits run out, general welfare is the only resort. Thereâ€" Departments Opinion .......... Community ....... Entertainment ..... Business ......... Sporls ........... Classified ........ &40 0 a "With that kind of ratio, it provides more opportunity for the field worker to assist the client in exploring their options. be they retraining, or upgrading, or other opportunities that may be out there in the community," Blowes said The social service department‘s field workers are also beginning to feel the strain of increasing welfare statistics Blowes says. As of the end of November each field worker was handling an average of 120 cases. An ideal ratio would be one field worker for 90 welfare cases * Periods of rain and ;m:4° oomattueh ® « 0 a d 19 ¢ 1 g.d‘éd ,‘d"d." * <« #**¢s t ° Advertising _ supplements _ delivered with tonight‘s Waterloo Chromicle: Zehrs ‘‘We‘ve already got some compames locally that have announced lavoffs for 1992, the one that immediately comes to mind is Uniroyal. And I think we‘re waiting to see what‘s going to happend with GM and what potential impact that will have locally on spinâ€"off industries." Blowes said. "Those kinds of things lead us to expect to continue to see an increase in applicants." fore, Blowes expects to see an even further increase in the region‘s number of welfare cases. Thursday‘s weather ~2" 29 pib. dd:¢§;o e e g d« 4 ¢ 6 w 6 ul "a uC se (Continued on page 3)