City of Powell River is applying for a grant designed to lead to greater equity in wellness by building on the community’s social, environmental, cultural and economic foundations.
At the October 22 committee of the whole meeting, director of planning services Jason Gow outlined the application process for the health promotions project and capacity building grants application through Vancouver Coastal Health. He said this is related to the community belonging project, which is something councillors learned about last year. He said in April of this year, council directed staff to work with the community belonging team to apply for funding to support the community belonging project.
Gow said in the committee’s agenda package, there was a copy of the grant application, which needs to be applied for by the city.
“It was suggested we bring it before you and I’m looking for direction for staff to work with the community belonging team,” said Gow. “We thought it would be a great opportunity for you to understand exactly the type of application that has been submitted and the type of work that is slated for next steps.”
According to a staff report, If successful, the grant funding would in part be used to host a one-day policy impact forum where managers from key city departments and the chief administrative officer would be invited to participate in discussions aimed at increasing opportunities for children with visible and invisible disabilities and their families to experience belonging and participation through city-run programs and services. The city would administer the funding and be responsible for all grant reporting, the report stated.
Councillor and committee chair Rob Southcott said he read the staff report carefully and that the previous report didn’t suggest as much of the city’s staff time as much as the current report does.
“It seems to be headed towards taking a lot more valuable staff time than what the original intention was,” said Southcott. “Can you comment on that? The context for me is that I absolutely don’t disagree with the fundamental principle behind what this project is about, but again, this is one of those things that is really in the provincial jurisdiction framework in my view. Is this more downloading to us?”
Gow said he had included the number of hours involved in the project in the memo just so council is aware.
“I’d like you to understand, however, those hours are spread across multiple departments; it’s not concentrated in one department area,” said Gow. “I did have a really informative conversation with the community belonging team today and something that was framed for me that I don’t think I understood is a question that arose from interviews. It was about how the city could address engagement in terms of being more inclusive and accessible. This is a group that is looking at people from our community that may inherently be challenged with the more typical engagement processes that we have.”
Councillor Cindy Elliott said it looks to be a training initiative that the city should be doing as part of its business. She said there are some grants to help along the way.
“The interaction with our frontline staff with these vulnerable people can only be improved and that improves the mental health of everybody in the community,” said Elliott. “I’ve talked to folks who are frontline staff about how ill-equipped they feel when they run into situations that they know they know they could be handling differently, but haven’t had the training. I’m super-happy to see this and believe it to be a worthwhile exercise that we probably should be doing, with or without this project.”
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