Kitchener All-Candidates October 21
"The event itself was a clear example of civic engagement, with people of all ages and backgrounds deep in discussion all around the room." Waterloo Region Record by Catherine Thompson.
VisitAble Housing Benefits Everybody
The Visitability Project is a three-year national initiative that runs until March 2016 to increasing awareness of VisitAble Housing to buyers, builders, policy makers and other stakeholders. Kitchener-Waterloo Task Force led by the Social Planning Council is one of the six teams across the country working to increase awareness, plans to develop a workshop and resource package for real estate agents about the benefits and selling features of VisitAble Housing. A checklist so agents can determine if a house they’re selling is VisitAble is also in the works. Read more from REM, Canada’s premier business publication for the real estate industry.
New Award Recognizes Leaders in Accessibility in Ontario
The Ontario Government recently annouced the creation of a new award, The David C. Onley Award for Leadership in Accessibility. This award will recognize leaders in four categories including employers, youth, employee engagement and role models who have gone above and beyond in improving accessibility for persons wtih disabilities and supporting awareness of accessibility and disability issues. Do you kow an indvidual or organization that you would like to nominate? Click here to download the nomination form and learn more about the award. The deadline to submit nominations is December 3rd of each year.
Poverty Reduction Strategy: Being Heard and Involved
Poverty Free Kitchener-Waterloo Action Group is keen to find out how local groups who are already active in poverty reduction work can be recognized and supported through the provincial Poverty Reduction Strategy to continue their work that brings those with lived poverty experience into the process as experts in their own right. Read below our comments on the provincial Poverty Reduction Strategy and get in touch to share yours.
Civic Declaration on Decent Work and Basic Income
We have a common stake in creating communities of shared opportunity for all. Investing in work that protects and enhances our environment, supports civic and community well-being, and grows local economies will produce social and economic benefits for all. Pursuing this path will demand the activation of a collective stewardship that engages all parts of the community in a discussion of how to work together for the common good. What work needs to be done to create and sustain the kinds of communities that we want to live in? Read the Poverty Free Ontario Bulletin: Crating Communities of Shared Opportunity across Ontario.
September E-Neighbour
The 2013-2014 Festival of Neighbourhoods season is coming to an end. Our summer outreach blitzes brought great joy to Millwood, Moorgate and Westchester neighbourhoods (read our outreach team's blogs). We have received 102 registrations and we expect more to come before the time runs out on October 5th!
Income Security for Refugees
Relying on local Members of the Parliament as strong advocates on refugee concerns in Kitchener-Waterloo, the Poverty Free KW Group has joined organizations across Ontario in asking them to reject the Bill C-585 that would have serious implications for the health and welfare of refugee claimants and many others awaiting permanent status in Canada. See more from the Income Security Advocacy Centre on the province-wide actions before the Bill goes to vote on September 16th.
SPC KW takes on the former Alliance for Children and Youth Mid Month Connection Newsletter!
As you may know from the annoucements made by the Alliance for Children and Youth (here and here), the Social Planning Council of K-W is taking over the Mid-Month Connection newsletter formerly put out by the Alliance. The newsletter has been renamed and rebranded as the Waterloo Region Child and Youth Connection, but will still feature the same great content that you're used to, such as events, announcements, tweets and research about children, youth and families in the Waterloo Region.
New Page on the Website & Twitter Handle
We've created a new Child and Youth page on our website to house the sign-up page and archives for the newsletter, past Alliance documents and information about our other streams of activity related to children and youth, such as our involvement in the Children's Planning Table and Child-Well-Being Dashboard. Visit the Child and Youth page to read our first newsletter or to sign up to have the newsletter delivered to your inbox each month. We've also taken over the Twitter account used by the Alliance, which has also been renamed; you can follow us over at @WRChildYouth.
Submitting Content to the Newsletter
If you would like to submit articles or events for inclusion in the newsletter, please contact Gillian Veitch at gillian@waterlooregion.org. or on Twitter at @WRChildYouth. Please note that the deadline for submission of articles or events is the 13th of each month.
Income Security Fund Shuffle
It has been reported that the basic needs allowance of single parents on social assistance will be reduced by $8 dollars starting August 1, due to the increase in Ontario Child Benefit bound to happen on October 1 (Carol Goar, The Star, July 31, 2014). In a context where the cost of living raises much faster than the social assistance rates, which are already gravely inadequate, reducing basic needs allowance when raising the Ontario Child Benefit is simply wrong policy.
© Social Development Centre Waterloo Region