COVID Safe Spaces - Living Room partnerships project funded by the Canada Healthy Communities Initiatives has come to an end... but it will live on through the two local initiatives Civic Hub Waterloo Region and Kitchener's Festival of Neighbourhoods! We have learned more about safety in a range of communities, beyond COVID safety, namely, physical, cultural, spiritual, emotional, and community safety. Our pop-up spaces were created in collaboration with the SHEN Centre, Peace for All Canada, L'Harmonie Indigenous Garden, Bring on the Sunshine, A Better Tent City, some of the unlikely places for a sofa and a floor lamp to be usual fixtures. Watch the full presentation of the project, and we hope to sit with you on the same sofa soon for an unusual conversation about safe public spaces.
SDC continues to adapt to the ever-changing context and relationships as the scope and depth of the needs of underserved and underrepresented communities becomes more evident every day. You can see it in your daily interactions and we continue to provide more research and data, especially on housing and homelessness in Waterloo Region. We need also to take a deeper look at our own capacity to respond to multiple calls for assistance and collaboration, as well as, to determine our sphere of influence with greater precision and clarity. Your input on these topics at the Annual General Meeting will be invaluable - 
Civic Hub Waterloo Region is the proud host for the development and rehearsals of the anti-poverty engaged theatre production rooted in lived expertise! Living Below the Line is a stereotype-busting work about struggle, resilience and hope, co-created by Watercourse Theatre and fourteen individuals living in poverty. Over the course of five free, regional public presentations between June 17- 25, these new actors will share their stories. Scenes include perspectives on stigma, a mock quiz show, and superheroes! “These stories are important truths, shared from the heart. I am honoured to help bring them to the stage,” says Catherine Frid, Artistic Director of Watercourse Theatre.
cChallenge WR will start June 2nd, 
The Social Development Centre has partnered with the City of Kitchener to initiate a Lived Expertise Working Group on housing. Over the next two years the working group will be advising the City of Kitchener’s 
SDC continues to adapt to the ever-changing context and relationships as the scope and depth of the needs of underserved and underrepresented communities becomes more evident every day. We need also to take a deeper look at our own capacity to respond to multiple calls for assistance and collaboration, as well as, to determine our sphere of influence with greater precision and clarity. Your input on these topics at the Annual General Meeting will be invaluable - 
The City of Kitchener and the Social Development Centre Waterloo Region (SDCWR) are recruiting members for a 2-year pilot project called the Housing Lived Expertise Working Group to support the implementation of the Housing For All strategy. 
What a year, 2021, and how COVID is changing us! The Kitchener Festival of Neighbourhoods concluded it 28th season in 2021 
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