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Municipal Candidate Education Campaign from Grey Bruce Counties

Posted by Natasha Pei on October 2, 2018


Municipal elections will take place across Ontario on October 22, 2018.

While voter awareness and education will be a key activity for many Cities Reducing Poverty partners this fall, the Grey Bruce Poverty Task Force is changing the focus and asking - how well are the 300+ candidates aware of and educated about local poverty issues?

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The Power of Questions

Posted by Jessica Fisher on October 1, 2018

I’m coming around to the idea that you can, in fact, respond to a question with another question, and still find valuable answers buried within.

Hear me out.

At work, our Founder and Director of Vibrant Communities, Paul Born, encourages me to continually ask questions, even if it means creating version eight or nine of a document I’m working on! Sure, this often feels like an endless cascade of twisting, turning questions, but this technique gets at the heart of the messy, imperfect work of poverty reduction. It reminds us that there are multiple ‘right’ answers to the complex questions we’re tackling.

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The State of Cities Reducing Poverty

Posted by Adam Vasey on September 18, 2018

How has the Vibrant Communities – Cities Reducing Poverty (VC – CRP) network contributed to poverty reduction in Canada? In seeking to answer this central question, the State of Cities Reducing Poverty paper highlights the network’s numerous and varied impacts.

As the paper documents, the VC – CRP multi-sector model has helped facilitate community leadership on poverty, including among mayors and municipal councils, the business community, and people with lived and living experience of poverty. The network has also led and contributed to significant policy and systems changes in domains such as living wage, transportation, housing, and financial empowerment.

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Cities Reducing Poverty Policy Digest: September 2018

Posted by Adam Vasey on September 17, 2018

This is the September 2018 edition of the Cities Reducing Poverty Policy Digest which aims to provide timely poverty-related policy updates and resources from across Canada.

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What to Expect When Joining Your Local Poverty Alliance

Posted by Hillary Geneau on September 4, 2018

At the end of 2017, I was looking for ways to get more involved in my community. When I first heard of the Leeds Grenville Poverty Alliance, I was intrigued, but could not figure out exactly what their mission was. When I attended my first meeting, I was quite intimidated, walking into a large boardroom with people who work on these issues every day. It soon became apparent that the work they do is meaningful, and that I was fortunate to be able to listen and learn. The following are some of the things I’ve learned about being a part of this group.

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Canada’s First Poverty Reduction Strategy: Opportunity For All

Posted by Alison Homer on August 29, 2018

The Government of Canada’s first Poverty Reduction Strategy, Opportunity For All, was released on August 21, 2018 in Vancouver, BC. Based on a vision of a Canada without poverty, and on the principle that all Canadians deserve a fair and real chance to succeed and live with dignity; the strategy commits to strengthening the middle class and helping those who are working hard to join it. Informed by an extensive community engagement process, Opportunity For All is organized by three pillars, establishing a working definition of poverty and official income poverty line, and a commitment to reducing the poverty rate in Canada by 50% by 2030.

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