At the last meeting of CCEDNet’s Board of Directors, Victor Beausoleil was selected as the new President of the Board. He takes over from Laurie Cook, who had been President since 2018.
Victor is the President + CEO of Intuit Consulting and the founder of SETSI – The Social Economy Through Social Inclusion Coalition. Victor has worked diligently in the broader equity seeking communities across Canada for the past fifteen years. As a lecturer, Victor has travelled extensively throughout Canada, the United States and Africa. Victor has been a board member of numerous foundations and organizations, including Atkinson Charitable Foundation, The Harriet Tubman Community Organization, and the Toronto Community Benefits Network. Read Victor’s full bio.
The Board extends its warm appreciation to Laurie Cook for her leadership over the last two years.
If you also submitted a brief we’d love to include it below…
Please send your pre-budget submission to Ben Losman at b.losman at ccednet-rcdec.ca.
Our Recommendations for the 2021 Federal Budget
1. Accelerate Social Innovation and Social Finance
a.
Produce a Social Innovation and Social Finance Strategy implementing all 12 recommendations of the Co-Creation steering group.
b.
Ensure equity seeking groups play a leading role in the implementation and subsequent evolution of the SISF strategy to build on existing local capacity and strengthen the expertise of the community economic development, non-profit, and co-operative sectors.
2. Support Resilient Local Enterprises
a.
Promote local and social procurement policies.
b.
Enable employee and community-based ownership succession and buyouts.
c.
Establish a national program to grow community investment funds in each province.
3. Build Economies for All
a.
Advance the decent work agenda to support good quality jobs and workers’ rights and well- being.
b.
Improve the efficacy of Labour Market and Workforce Development dollars to reach vulnerable groups seeking workplace skills and training, and ensure that an increased percentage of LMTA funding is directed at vulnerable groups.
c.
Accelerate the timeline of the Universal Broadband Fund, and use it to encourage community-owned broadband.
The Governance Group is a key vehicle for community ownership of the Common Approach. For the Common Approach to be successful in establishing a flexible standard of impact measurement in Canada for the benefit of social-purpose organizations and others, it is important that there is an active and engaged community of folks overseeing the evolution and refinement of the standard. Successful standards are the community behind them.
This is an exciting time to join the Common Approach, and the new Governance Group is a great way to get involved. First-term members will:
Draw on good governance experience of fiscal oversight, ethics, and risk management
Develop the Strategic Planning Framework for the Common Approach
Oversee the adoption strategy and identify pathways for engagement with other stakeholders and social purpose organizations across Canada
Provide oversight of the four standards that include: The Common Foundations, Common Form, the Common Framework, and the Common Impact Data Standard
Support partner and funding development to ensure that the Common Approach can meet its potential
The Common Approach will hold a Q & A webinar on Tuesday, September 8 at 2:00 pm ET to answer any and all questions you might have about the governance model and the call.
Interested, or know someone who might be? To apply, send a resumé and a letter that expresses your interest in the Governance Group for the Common Approach to Impact Measurement to Joanna Reynolds: joanna (at) socialinnovation.ca
CCEDNet member Roger Peters is an engineer and policy analyst with over 40 years experience in co-operatives, clean energy, and local economic development. He is a founding member of the Ottawa Renewable Energy and CoEnergy Ontario Co-operatives.
The virtual shut down of the World’s economies as a result of COVID-19 has exposed their fragility and accentuated their inequality. Our current reliance on conventional business models is not working. As we re-build, we should not bail out large corporations, but rather create more resilient and equitable local economies.
COVID-19 has also shown us how much we rely on the supply of goods and services from outside our community. The world economy has become precarious too – products we buy usually contain parts made in many different countries. This may have been more efficient for corporations in pre-COVID 19 times, but it is not resilient enough in a world that will see more pandemics and changing climate. Local communities need to have more say in what is made in their economy and how the rewards are shared. Municipalities must be able to influence local job creation and ownership through their procurement and urban development policies.
Worker or employee co-operatives have existed for many years and have been shown to be more resilient than conventional businesses in times of crisis. The reason for this is that in a worker co-operative everyone has a financial stake in the enterprise, shares in its success, and equitably manages its failures. It is rooted in the community. In a conventional business, employees are an expense and profits for investors are paramount.
The time is also right for rebuilding a more democratic business model. Many small business owners may not want or be able to restart their businesses after COVID 19. Many baby boomers who own businesses are ready to retire (the so called “silver tsunami”). There is a real interest and opportunity to save these companies by selling them to those who work for them. Many Canadians are also wanting to have more say in their work lives.
Cities are taking control of their economies
Cities around the world have started to see local procurement and worker co-operatives as keys to more permanent and equitable economic development, taking things into their own hands rather than relying on outside investment to provide jobs.
In 2008, the City of Cleveland joined with several other local “anchor” institutions (including the Cleveland Foundation, the Cleveland Clinic, University Hospitals, and Case Western Reserve University) to found the Evergreen Cooperative Initiative to create living-wage jobs in six low-income neighborhoods. The initiative focuses on building a local economy from the ground up rather than a trickle-down strategy from outside investment.
The anchor institutions agreed to use their significant procurement power to purchase more goods and services locally. This both keeps money in the community and builds secure good quality local jobs. The Evergreen Co-operative Initiative supports new employee owned worker co-operatives and acquires and converts conventional business into worker co-ops that can provide the goods and services required by the anchors. Evergreen Co-operatives now employ more than 250 people at three core businesses: an industrial laundry, an urban greenhouse, and an energy-efficiency contractor. A Fund for Employee Ownership has been set up to help acquire businesses that wish to convert to a worker co-operative and to help to develop new co-ops – particularly small businesses owned by “baby boomers” wishing to retire.
Over in Preston, UK, the local council was faced with a dilemma when a large development project in the centre of the city fell through in 2011. Following Cleveland’s example, they persuaded the local university and other anchor institutions to begin procuring goods and services from local sources. Using what is now called “the Preston Model” in just 5 years Preston has become the most improved city in the UK according to the Good Growth Index.
They also set up The Preston Co-operative Development Network (PCDN) to develop and support local employee owned enterprises which was modelled on the very successful support network for employee owned producer co-operatives in Mondragon, Spain.
Rather than acquiring business like Evergreen, the PDCN assists conventional business convert to independent employee co-operatives and helps to establish new ones to fill the gaps in anchor institution procurement needs. Like Mondragon, the network includes several key support functions – education (training of potential co-op employees), R&D (to identify new opportunities), and financial (to finance co-op conversion and development).
Other cities are following Cleveland’s and Preston’s lead.
Promoting and supporting local procurement and employee ownership through the Cleveland and Preston models are key elements of what is known as Community Wealth Building. This new model of democratic economic development seeks to give local institutions and citizens more control over their economy and workplaces and keep more of the generated wealth in the community. This means supporting, for example, municipal ownership of services, social procurement strategies, land trusts for affordable housing, worker co-operatives, credit unions, and local training and apprenticeships. As well as using direct support, some cities are requiring that new developments meet certain targets for community wealth building through Community Benefit Agreements.
The term social procurement refers to procurement from social enterprises, which are defined as those that have an embedded mission to achieve social, cultural or environmental aims and use at least 50% of profits to further this mission. Cities are beginning to incorporate social procurement into their overall procurement strategies.
Legislation Supporting Employee Ownership
Several EU countries, including Spain, Italy and France have “right to own” legislation which gives employees the first opportunity to buy out a company when the current owner wishes to sell or has to sell because of financial problems. Italy also has a comprehensive legal structure for employee owned enterprises that allows for multi-stakeholder membership drawn from two or more “stakeholder” members including consumers, producers, investors, and community supporters. This allows multi-stakeholder co-operative enterprises (also known as solidarity co-ops) to take on a much wider range of businesses, and allow all citizens to participate in a democratic economy.
Quebec has led the way in North America creating a comprehensive structure for multi-stakeholder co-operatives through the Quebec Co-operatives Act which includes worker co-operatives, worker shareholder co-operatives, and solidarity or multi-stakeholder co-operatives consisting of employee, user/customers, or “supporters”.
Through the advocacy of the Illinois Coalition for Cooperative Advancement, in 2019 the State of Illinois passed the Limited Worker Co-operative Association Act. This creates a new structure for employee owned and multi-stakeholder co-operatives in which employees own greater than 51% of the shares. It creates more visibility and financing options for worker co-operatives.
Community Financing of Employee Ownership
Millions of people around the world have retirement savings invested in conventional financial institutions and stock markets. There is a real desire for these savings to be invested in more specific green and community ventures as long as people still obtain a reasonable return. With the multi-stakeholder co-operative legal structures described above, this huge pool of capital could help to finance employee ownership of new businesses and start-ups.
Local Investing YYC is a Calgary based co-operative that pools member capital and invests it on their behalf in local enterprises in Alberta and Western Canada. The Ottawa Renewable Energy Cooperative (OREC) is a renewable energy co-operative in Ontario that uses member capital to purchase or build medium scale solar power systems, and sells this power to the grid or to building owners under long term contracts. OREC already has over $8 million of assets. In 2019, OREC set up CoEnergy Ontario Co-operative – a multi-stakeholder co-operative to finance energy retrofit and other clean energy projects. CoEnergy has two classes of members – community members who invest and consumer members who use the co-op’s services.
Investment shares in both Local Investing YYC and OREC/CoEnergy are RRSP and TFASA eligible so that members can simply transfer retirement funds from their existing RRSP as well as add each year.
While neither Local Investing YYC or OREC/CoEnergy currently invest in employee owned enterprises or include employee members, the model could easily embrace this. It would open the flood gates for ordinary citizens to finance the building of a more resilient local economy.
Political Support for Employee and Community Ownership is Growing
In 2017, the United Kingdom Labour Party commissioned a report to look at “Alternative Models of Ownership” reviewing the options to support worker co-operatives, municipal led economic development, and local public ownership. The New Economics Foundation prepared “Co-operatives Unleashed” for Labour proposing several policies that would increase employee ownership as well as community wealth building in the UK, including using the Preston Model and “right to own” legislation.
In the United States, the New Economy Coalition through their Pathways to a Peoples Economy Project have laid out a series of policies such as “right to own” that would support and ramp up worker ownership. The Democracy Collaborative has started an initiative called Fifty by Fifty whose goal is to catalyze a movement with the knowledge, resources, and skills to grow the number of employee owners in the U.S.
In Canada, the NDP’s Charlie Angus has proposed policies that would give workers the legal right of first refusal to purchase a closing business and restructure it as a worker co-operative, as well as harmonize worker co-operative legislation regulation across provinces.
The Canadian Worker Co-operatives Federation is proposing four actions that would help multi-stakeholder co-operatives lead the way in rebuilding the economy post COVID-19 – a long term patient capital fund to support the development of new co-ops; technical assistance to small and medium scale businesses convert to worker co-operatives; emergency relief for existing co-operatives; and promotional and marketing strategies.
Buy Social Canada is proposing that as part of a post COVID 19 rebuilding strategy, social enterprises be eligible for all business support initiatives, and that local small businesses and social enterprise value criteria on all government procurement.
A Plan for Rebuilding Resilient and Equitable Local Economies
All this activity and experience around the world gives us the ingredients for a major rebuilding plan after COVID 19 – a strategy that gives municipalities the tools and policies they need to rebuild their local economies and community wealth:
Short Term Measures:
Provide financial support to municipal governments to adopt a “Preston Model” approach to local economic development, including the resources to create a local or regional Co-operative Development Network that would develop and support local employee owned enterprises with education and training of potential co-op employees, R&D to identify new opportunities, and finance of co-op conversion and development.
Provide financial and technical assistance and tax incentives to companies wanting to transition to a worker co-operative as they rebuild.
Provide financial and other incentives to large anchor institutions that procure goods and services from local employee owned businesses, and reform procurement rules accordingly. Promote local production and sourcing through labelling and other means.
Require all government financed projects to include a Community Benefits Agreement signed with the contractor and the local community that includes the procurement of goods and services from employee owned businesses and social enterprises, as well training/financing to achieve this goal.
Provide tax credits or other incentives to encourage investment of citizen capital in employee owned or multi-stakeholder co-operatives.
Legislative Changes:
Create new legislation, or modify the existing Cooperative Corporations Acts, to provide a harmonized legal structure for multi-stakeholder worker co-operatives across Canada – a structure that provides these co-operatives with the flexibility to include community investment and customer members, and full access to all of services and assistance currently available to other corporations. *
Create “Right to Own” Legislation that would provide employees of companies that are going out of business, or owners wanting to sell, the right of first refusal to purchase the company as a worker co-operative, and negotiate and finance a buy-out fair to all parties.*
* These two legislative changes could be incorporated into a new Employee Ownership Act.
*The opinions expressed in blog posts are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the position of CCEDNet
Innovative Manitoba Social Enterprises are Scaling Up with New Financial Support
Over winter and spring 2020, a collaborative mix of partners (including foundations, charities, co-operatives, businesses and economic development organizations) came together to bring new resources to Manitoba social purpose enterprises building their capacity for social impact and possible new investment. Hosted by The Winnipeg Foundation and the Canadian Community Economic Development Network (CCEDNet) – Manitoba, the group evaluated 39 applications in the first round of available funding and is pleased to announce $405,737.50 of support to 13 social purpose organizations in Manitoba.
This new funding is part of the Government of Canada’s Investment Readiness Program (IRP). The social enterprises involved create important opportunities for Indigenous communities, create meaningful jobs, strengthen the charitable and non-profit sector, and address social and environmental challenges. These organizations often face challenges unique to their innovative blend of business practice and social impact. As a result of these new funds, organizations will be better prepared to stabilize or scale up their work and potentially receive investment, including through the Government of Canada’s developing Social Finance Fund.
Organizations supported include:
$40,000 – Aboriginal Chamber of Commerce
$30,000 – Aulneau Renewal Centre
$13,000 – BUILD Inc. (Building Urban Industries for Local Development)
$32,000 – Clan Mothers Enterprises
$26,000 – Clan Mothers Healing Village
$14,600 – End Homelessness Winnipeg
$30,000 – Green Action Centre Inc. (Compost Winnipeg)
$12,000 – Level IT Up
$40,000 – Mitik 299 Corp
$47,000 – North End Community Renewal Corporation
$49,600 – Purpose Construction
$34,000 – Social Enterprise Centre
$37,537.50 – Wahbung Abinoonjiiag
“Manitoba has a long history of innovation in the social sector. The IRP represents an opportunity to further support innovation in organizations we know will address our communities’ needs” noted Alan Goddard, director of Endow Manitoba, an initiative of The Winnipeg Foundation.
“Social enterprises are incredible vehicles for social impact and they’re doing important work, especially during this challenging period of pandemic response. These groups can help to build resilient, inclusive, sustainable communities and this new support will be invaluable as they grow their impact” says Sarah Leeson-Klym, Regional Networks Director for CCEDNet.
Social purpose organizations strengthen local economies while giving back and creating more resilient and sustainable communities. The IRP creates and advances new earned revenue possibilities for the critical role charities, non-profits, and cooperatives play, especially during this challenging time. For these reasons, the IRP has a key role to play in pandemic recovery and also in moving Canada towards the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals. They promote prosperity while protecting people and our planet.
For more information about the IRP, visit the national website at irp-ppi.ca. Applications for the second and final round of funding for the IRP will be accepted starting September 8, 2020 until October 9, 2020.
For more information on the Manitoba local fund or second round, please contact:
Frank Atnikov, Social Enterprise Program Manager, CCEDNet Manitoba
f.atnikov (at) ccednet-rcdec.ca, 204-943-0547 x 205
(Alternate contact: Sarah Leeson-Klym, sleesonklym (at) ccednet-rcdec.ca, 204-943-0547 x 202)
About The Winnipeg Foundation: The Winnipeg Foundation connects donors from all walks of life with local charitable organizations that help our city flourish for all. The Foundation is an endowment-based organization which means gifts received are pooled and invested. The income generated provides a stable source of support for our community For Good. Forever. Established in 1921, The Winnipeg Foundation is Canada’s first community foundation. Endow Manitoba is an initiative of The Winnipeg Foundation that works with the province’s 56 community foundations to increase their impact and advance the movement. Learn more about them at www.wpgfdn.org.
About CCEDNet: A national association connecting people and ideas for action to build local economies that strengthen communities and benefit everyone. In Manitoba, the Network is focused on building strength, knowledge, connection, and power in community organizations and social economy enterprises. Social Enterprise Manitoba is an initiative of CCEDNet Manitoba.
About the Program: Community Foundations of Canada (CFC) is a partner in the Investment Readiness Program (IRP) which helps deliver capital from the Government of Canada to social purpose organizations preparing to successfully participate in the social finance market. For more information about the IRP, visit the national website at irp-ppi.ca.
The federal government’s role as backstop during the COVID-19 pandemic doesn’t end with the first wave of reopening—Canada needs to step up with more investments to ensure a just, equitable and sustainable recovery, says the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA) in the 25th year of its Alternative Federal Budget project.
Among the key issues in the Alternative Federal Budget (AFB) Recovery Plan requiring immediate action: implement universal public child care so people can get back to work, reform employment insurance, strengthen safeguards for public health, decarbonize the economy, and tackle the gender, racial, and income inequality that COVID-19 has further exposed.
AFB proposals specific to community economic development (CED) include:
the complete decarbonization of the Canadian economy and a just transition toward sustainable, progressive, and democratic economic systems
the development of long-term reconstruction projects that achieve the most social and redistributive impact — projects that incorporate community benefits clauses and social, environmental, equity, diversity, and inclusion criteria
the allocation of $3 billion to expanding/ supporting new nonprofit community initiatives that reduce social and economic inequities, with a focus on racial and gender equality, decolonization, and alternatives to policing and incarceration. This funding will include:
capacity-building support for Black community organizations and funds to improve access to essential food supports for Black Canadians
funds that support collaboration among nonprofit sector members, specifically by covering staffing and operating costs
the promotion of local and social procurement, including through Community Benefit Agreements, that address racial, gender, and other inequalities in the labour market.
the facilitation of employee- and community-based ownership succession and buyouts of struggling businesses
The AFB Recovery Plan also outlines concrete steps, with attached funding, necessary to address Indigenous reconciliation, and paves the way for improvements in health care, long- term care, racial justice, and poverty reduction.
“COVID-19 has opened the public eye to the capacity of the government to help regular people, not just the banks and corporate Canada, in times of crisis. We should be using the same approach to ensure that everyone—especially the most disadvantaged and marginalized— have the supports they need to recover,” said CCPA Senior Economist David Macdonald.
We are pleased to welcome Raissa Marks aboard the CCEDNet team, as our new Government Relations Director. Raissa will be leading our policy and advocacy work and will be key in building relationships with Ministers, MPs, senators, and civil servants in Ottawa to advance the CED community’s shared policy goals.
Policy and advocacy have always been important parts of CCEDNet’s work. In fact, when the organization was incorporated in 1999, one of the first things that brought the national network together was a series of five regional meetings culminating in a National Policy Forum, which resulted in our first ever national policy framework.
Times have changed since then, but policy remains an important weave in the fabric of CCEDNet. Over the past couple of months, we have seen tremendous growth in our capacity to deliver on policy and advocacy work, thanks to the leadership of five of our members – CEDEC (Community Economic Development and Employability Corporation) in Quebec, Quint Development Corporation in Saskatoon, SEED Winnipeg Inc., Momentum Community Economic Development Society in Calgary, and PARO Centre for Women’s Enterprise in Thunder Bay – whose commitment and financial contributions have enabled us to hire Raissa for this work.
You may have already noticed the increase in our capacity, with the invitation to participate in the development of our 2020 national policy priorities that went out to CCEDNet members a few weeks ago.
There will be many other opportunities for members to engage with this work over the coming months. Watch for regular updates on our advocacy work with the federal government, capacity-building workshops and resources to help you up your advocacy game, and, possibly, regional policy workshops and a national day of CED policy action!
A bit of background about Raissa…She comes to us from the environmental NGO sector, having worked for the New Brunswick Environmental Network for the past 14 years, most recently serving as their Executive Director. She is excited to be with CCEDNet and, in addition to the policy and advocacy work, to help break down the silos between the CED world and the environmental movement. She has recently moved to Montreal with her family, and looks forward to train-rides back and forth to Ottawa once in-person meetings become a thing again!
We, the undersigned, are a collaborative partnership of network leaders in social innovation, social finance, the social economy, and community economic development across Canada. We provide this joint statement to deepen our commitment to rooting out racism, colonization, and exclusion in our work and sector.
We, the undersigned, collectively acknowledge that colonialism has deep roots in Canada and its legacy persists in society’s intolerable treatment of people of African descent. While issues of systemic racism are present for many people living in Canada, we acknowledge the recent and disproportionately fatal incidents within Indigenous and Black communities. We also acknowledge generations of African Nova Scotians who have resisted oppression in isolation in the Maritimes.
As a collective, we recognize the only sensible position to take in the face of racism is anti-racism. In our work towards sustainable and inclusive communities we denounce anti-Black racism in every malicious form it takes; in our communities, our organizations, and in Canada’s systems and institutions.
We are also committed to confronting economic arrangements that are unsound, and which concentrate capital and exclude many people living in Canada. We are committed to equity in access to capital, sharing power and addressing the systemic barriers that exacerbate wealth disparity.
In 2019, as part of our 20th anniversary celebrations, CCEDNet created the Stronger Together Award. The award celebrates people who have made exceptional contributions to community economic development and people who have provided outstanding leadership in CCEDNet. The inaugural awards were given to three people who had received honorary lifetime memberships over the years: Eunice Grayson, Stewart Perry and Rankin MacSween.
This year, we are thrilled to honour Diana Jedig with the Stronger Together Award.
Diana joined the CCEDNet Board of Directors in 2005; she stepped down at the 2020 AGM, making her the longest-serving Board member in CCEDNet’s history. She has participated in and chaired the Practitioner and Sector Strengthening Committee and the Finance Committee. When CCEDNet’s Board said that work needed to be done to create a solid set of policies and procedures, Jedig volunteered to Chair the Personnel Committee and built CCEDNet’s very thorough policy manual.
Diana represented the Board at the partnership table of the largest project CCEDNet has administered, the Social Enterprise Ecosystem project. She has been a crucial link between CCEDNet and the largest network of place-based economic development organizations in the country, the Community Futures and Community Business Development Corporations as part of our policy work and project development.
Diana is the only person to have been President, Vice-President, Secretary and Treasurer of the CCEDNet Board. She also hosted EconoUs2019, one of CCEDNet’s largest national conferences ever.
Diana has played a huge role in building CCEDNet, and has served as mentor and friend to many CCEDNet staff members, partners, and allies.
Congratulations Diana, and thank you for your unparalleled leadership!
On June 11, CCEDNet members gathered online to participate in the 2020 Annual General Meeting (AGM). Turnout was record high with nearly 100 registrants!
Feedback from our members following the AGM was positive:
Thanks to the staff and board for all your great work!! Congrats on the great results from this year, and a successful AGM.
C’était ma première participation à votre AGA. J’ai hâte de continuer de vous découvrir, vous êtes inspirants!
Always great to check in with CCEDNet. Wish I had time to be more involved.
I have such admiration for CCEDNet’s people and work. Please keep doing what you are doing!
Exciting to have so many people there.
Watch the AGM Recording
CCEDNet’s Executive Director, Mike Toye, presented highlights from 2019 and as well as the audited financial statements.
Members congratulated new Board members Victor Beausoleil, Michelle Colussi, Kaye Grant, and Gail Henderson, and expressed gratitude to outgoing Board members Hazel Corcoran, Krista Bissiallon and Walter Hossli.
In a heartfelt presentation, Diana Jedig accepted CCEDNet’s Stronger Together Award for exceptional contributions to community economic development and outstanding leadership in CCEDNet over the course of two decades. A tree has been planted in her honour in Reforest London’s Celebration Forest, alongside trees planted for inaugural Stronger Together Award recipients Eunice Grayson, Stewart Perry, and Rankin MacSween, who were honoured at EconoUs2019.
Members also reviewed CCEDNet’s draft Theory of Change (ToC). The document is intended to ground the work of the organization in the principles of intersectionality and intersectoral collaboration, with the goal of fostering sustainable and inclusive communities directing their own futures. Members received the ToC with enthusiasm. Responses to the ToC included:
I’ll use this to explain CED To my parents 🙂 Love the increased focus on climate resilience
Appreciate the focus on marginalized community and grounding in lived experience
I like the way the theory of change is laid out in a way that is easy to follow and easy to talk about. The values come out clearly and gives u ways to discuss shared and lived experiences.
[I love how] it all hangs together… [with] the integration of climate with economy – brilliant!
The Board will continue to plan for further member engagement through its developement and its implementation across the organization.
Many thanks to the many members who participated, the staff who organized the logistics, and to CCEDNet’s Board members who guide the Network throughout the year!
Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, Canadians have been fascinated by reports of African Americans dying from COVID-19 at three times the rate of their white counterparts. It is clear now that similar disparities have played out in the poorest regions of Canada.
In recent weeks the overarching themes of “othering”, and systemic and institutional racism across North America in the form of vile police brutality and the murder of people of African descent, has once again raised questions regarding the moral fabric of our society and nation.
Canada and countless sectors and ecosystems within our nation have had a long history of injustice, disenfranchisement and exclusionary practices. The racial divisions within the social finance, social enterprise and community economic development ecosystem are clear to my colleagues and I within SETSI.
Since the fall economic statement of 2018 and the announcement of the Social Finance Fund, we have collectively used words such as inclusion, diversity, equity and access. We have also worked diligently as an ecosystem to become and support others in “investment readiness”.
But as an ecosystem we have yet to ask the question, are we ready for inclusion?
Clearly the desire for investment readiness is seductive, but if public dollars committed by the federal government in our ecosystem exclude African Canadians from an equitable seat at the table, we have missed the mark. Over the past year my colleagues and I have devoted our time, resources and social capital towards raising awareness of the Investment Readiness Program and supporting partners within the ecosystem, but of late we are clearly recognizing a lack of interest and action as it relates to inclusion, diversity, equity and access or even reciprocity.
The emblematic denial of systemic racism and the overt “othering” we have experienced is troublesome based on the collective progressiveness of this sector. Some of our colleagues within our ecosystem are willing to listen and learn, but very few have been willing to take action.
The radical re-imagining required to cultivate and harness the potential of those on the periphery of the social enterprise and social finance ecosystem seems untenable. Tolerance and empty platitudes have been a consistent theme from most organizational leaders we have engaged. We have regularly gone back to our small corner in the ecosystem and facilitated our work humbly without calling out the challenges we have faced.
We recognize that this struggle for economic equity and inclusion is not for the faint of heart. Actions based on evolving economic data, and ecosystem trends are imperative post covid-19. These actions are even more vital in the midst of the dehumanizing violations people of African descent face daily, but are now once again being highlighted.
There are many key stakeholders across Canada that can effortlessly partner, support and engage people of African descent, but it seems this is not a priority or needs to be incentivised which is also troubling.
Do publically funded institutions and organizations within the social finance and social enterprise ecosystem require government intervention to engage African Canadians, or partner with African Canadian orgs?
At SETSI, from inception, it has been our aim to co-create an ecosystem that respects diversity, but what we have witnessed is an exclusive stratified ecosystem dominated by one common group. This model weakens the entire ecosystem, as well it distorts and perverts the values we claim to hold dear as Canadians.
The intractable economic realties of people of African descent are clear to statisticians, policy analysts across governmental departments and within the boardrooms of orgs and institutions in our sector. Unfortunately the competitive nature of funding and the lack and scarcity mindset that permeates our ecosystem incentivizes exclusion.
On countless occasions my colleagues and I have raised with respect and empathy the clear lack of inclusion, diversity, equity and access in our ecosystem, and we are met with excuses of powerlessness. This stance almost insults our intelligence. Many of the partners in the ecosystem have great power, privilege and access. Partners have policy shops, seasoned lobbyists, numerous staff, buildings and various assets, healthy budgets and decades of intellectual property and digital assets. As a sector we are collectively very powerful and influential.
At SETSI it is our aim moving forward to engage as full citizens in this ecosystem, naming and framing challenges while still operating in good faith to co-create solutions. We recognize systems change and systemic transformation is challenging, but it is even more challenging when alleged allies are silent or willing to only speak up, and not act.
As a sector we must develop inclusion readiness, as well as collectively cultivating diverse talent pools and partnerships with unlikely allies. We engaged our membership over the past few weeks, our partners and allies and have identified a few priority actions;
The development of a standing meeting/working group in the social enterprise and social finance ecosystem, to work towards advancing inclusion, diversity, equity and access. Performance indicators as well as tools for measuring this work are an important mandate of this group.
Diversity & Inclusion policy promotion and development amongst Investment Readiness Program partners and ecosystem stakeholders within their respective orgs.
The development and implementation of an intermediary specifically for the African Canadian community in the Social Finance Fund.
Ecosystem partners collaborating for the development of a self-determined fund to engage the traditionally under-represented Canadians in the social finance and social enterprise ecosystem through small catalyst grants and non-repayable loans.
The aforementioned priority actions are not demands or even recommendations, these are actions that SETSI as well as our partners and allies are working towards executing. We are seeking authentic allies and collaborators to exponentially scale the work we have begun.
African Canadians and numerous other equity-seeking groups have been maltreated, both unintentionally and callously, by various professional disciplines. Social responsibility sentiments are not enough to combat systemic oppression. In this moment our call to actions is predicated on redefining partnership and the sharing of power. Transformation cannot occur without profound truth telling, followed up with courageous action.
On behalf of SETSI as well as our partners and allies I thank you for your consideration, and I look forward to hearing back from you as it relates to how you can support the work ahead of us.
One of my favourite African words is “Ubuntu”, which is a Bantu term that literally means “humanity”. Ubuntu is usually expressed in a phrase,
“I am because we are”
I encourage you to stand with us and demonstrate empathy for those on the margins of our ecosystem, and turn this moment into a movement.
We have moved from a known pool of experience into a strait of great discomfort and reckoning.
No matter where you are on this remarkable planet, you have likely been feeling through the depths, constraints, and entanglements of what it means to be human in this time.
In our work toward sustainable and inclusive communities directing their own futures, CCEDNet stands in solidarity with Black people and communities everywhere. We decry anti-Black racism in every pernicious form it takes; in our relationships, our communities, our organizations, and in Canada’s systems and institutions. We call out to every person living in Canada to join in the life work of dismantling white supremacy in all its forms.
We celebrate the brilliance, dignity, and leadership of Black people, communities, and organizations. We call for an intersectional, collaborative, community-led approach to justice, giving thanks to and uplifting the leadership of one of CCEDNet’s members, the Social Economy Through Social Inclusion Coalition (SETSI), for their powerful open letter.
We believe that budgets tell important stories, and commit to advocating for divestment from systems of harm toward reinvestment in life-affirming, generative, and generous networks of care. We believe that representation deeply matters, and commit to centering and uplifting stories by people whose voices are unjustly pushed to the peripheries. We believe communities know what they need to thrive and commit to listening deeply to and following community leadership.
With wholehearted determination, we will build frameworks to centre health and well being. We will trust in the power of relationships. We will commit to the question of how to be human together now.
Some straits have the potential to generate significant tidal power. Let’s make this tidal shift one of generational proportions.
toward equity, solidarity, and dignity,
CCEDNet Board & Staff
At the last meeting of CCEDNet’s Board of Directors, Victor Beausoleil was selected as the new President of the Board. He takes over from Laurie Cook, who had been President since 2018.
CCEDNet member Roger Peters is an engineer and policy analyst with over 40 years experience in co-operatives, clean energy, and local economic development. He is a founding member of the 
Several EU countries, including Spain, Italy and France have “
In 2017, the United Kingdom Labour Party commissioned a report to look at “
Among the key issues in the Alternative Federal Budget (AFB) Recovery Plan requiring immediate action: implement universal public child care so people can get back to work, reform employment insurance, strengthen safeguards for public health, decarbonize the economy, and tackle the gender, racial, and income inequality that COVID-19 has further exposed. 
In 2019, as part of our 20th anniversary celebrations, CCEDNet created the Stronger Together Award. The award celebrates people who have made exceptional contributions to community economic development and people who have provided outstanding leadership in CCEDNet. The inaugural awards were given to three people who had received honorary lifetime memberships over the years: Eunice Grayson, Stewart Perry and Rankin MacSween. 
Diana represented the Board at the partnership table of the largest project CCEDNet has administered, the Social Enterprise Ecosystem project. She has been a crucial link between CCEDNet and the largest network of place-based economic development organizations in the country, the 
Clearly the desire for investment readiness is seductive, but if public dollars committed by the federal government in our ecosystem exclude African Canadians from an equitable seat at the table, we have missed the mark. Over the past year my colleagues and I have devoted our time, resources and social capital towards raising awareness of the Investment Readiness Program and supporting partners within the ecosystem, but of late we are clearly recognizing a lack of interest and action as it relates to inclusion, diversity, equity and access or even reciprocity.
At SETSI, from inception, it has been our aim to co-create an ecosystem that respects diversity, but what we have witnessed is an exclusive stratified ecosystem dominated by one common group. This model weakens the entire ecosystem, as well it distorts and perverts the values we claim to hold dear as Canadians.
