English – Page 98 – Canadian CED Network

This month Canadian CED Network is featuring Karim Harji, Manager of Partnership Development at Social Capital Partners (SCP) in Toronto. SCP is a national non-profit that provides growth financing and strategic advice to successful businesses that demonstrate a social mission in their human resources model and are looking to expand career opportunities for disadvantaged populations. Karim is also co-founder of the dynamic website www.socialfinance.ca and a member of the Canadian CED Network’s Emerging Leaders committee.

Click here to read the full story!

Saskatchewan’s March 24 budget eliminated funding for neighbourhood development organizations. CCEDNet has written to the Premier and Minister of Social Services urging the government to reverse this decision.

Click here for the full text of our letter

Summit organizers are pleased to announce that the Hon. Michael Ignatieff, Leader of the Liberal Party of Canada, will address Summit participants.

Speakers continue to be added to the Summit program as details are confirmed. For all the latest information, check the Summit Program Overview regularly.

The deadline for on-line registrations is May 21st – avoid any last-minute complications and register now!

This is the last week for input on the issue papers and recommendations prior to the Summit. In order to be considered for the documents that will be presented at the Summit, changes must be posted to the Wiki by May 15. Visit the wiki at: people-centredeconomy.wikispot.org.

We hope to see you at the Summit!

With only a few weeks left before the 2010 National Summit on a People-Centred Economy, momentum is building towards this landmark event.

In addition to best-selling author Raj Patel, Michael Peck from Mondragon International and Ken Delaney from the United Steelworkers, the list of confirmed speakers now includes David Berge, Senior Vice-President of Community Investment at Vancity Credit Union, Susan Tanner, Executive Director of the Canadian Environmental Network and others. An updated summary of the Summit Program can be found in the Summit Program Overview.

Telelearning sessions on Summit issue papers are now underway. These FREE 1-hour sessionson the Summit themes present leading researchers and practitioner organizations. For the full schedule of sessions and speakers, see the Summit engagement web page. (www.ccednet-rcdec.ca/en/summit/engagement#telelearning). To register, phone 250-472-4976 or email , with your name, location, and work or volunteer position.

Did you know you could post suggested comments and changes to the 2010 National Summit issue papers? Please do so by visiting the wiki: people-centredeconomy.wikispot.org. The revised papers will be presented at the National Summit from which a common declaration and action plan will be developed. In order to be included prior to the summit, changes must be posted to the Wiki by May 15.

If you have not yet made accommodation reservations in Ottawa, do so quickly. The weekend prior to the Summit is Ottawa Race weekend, so finding accommodations may be more difficult than usual. Space is still available at a great price on campus at Carleton University, and on-line bookings can be made until May 17. Are you interested in having a booth at the Summit Tradeshow, or would you like to be an official Summit sponsor? Check out the Exhibitor and Partnership Brochure or contact Matthew Thompson directly at 416-760-2578, or by email at .

We hope to see you at the Summit!

On April 12, 2010, Doug Donaldson, MLA, Stikine, Deputy Finance Critic and active member of the Canadian CED Network, made a private members statement in the legislature on the need for a meaningful Rural BC Strategy and the role Community Economic Development could play in helping support our northern communities with the proper focus. You can view my statement at : Rural B.C. Community Economic Development – D. Donaldson, MLA – April 12, 2010

Links for other clips on Doug’s Facebook site: http://www.facebook.com/dougdonaldsonmla?v=app_2347471856#!/dougdonaldsonmla?v=app_3801015922

Thank you Doug for all the work you do to help make your community a better, stronger, and healthier place to live and work.

Click here to view the full Hansard of statement and exchange.

The Social Economy stories are designed to provide practitioners’ perspectives on what the Social Economy means to them and their communities. In particular, the stories featured here highlight the voices of Aboriginal, immigrant and women practitioners. Check back, each month as the Canadian CED Network will be featuring a new practitioner of the month.

This month Canadian CED Network is featuring Magdalena Santa Maria Chimbor, a civil society leader, a CED activist, and a prominent member of the women’s movement in Chiclayo, Peru. She is one of the founding members of the Solidarity Economy Initiatives Group (GIES), which opened its first national branch in Chiclayo in 1999.

Want to learn more about international movements and CED? Attend the up-coming ” Towards a Global People Centered Economy ” Telelearning session on May 6th at 9am PST, noon EST. For more information and to register click here: http://www.ccednet-rcdec.ca/en/summit/engagement#telelearning

Our friend and colleague died today. Many of you knew Raymond DesRochers. Those of you who did not, I invite to pause to hear a brief testimony from one who did. A glimpse of this man’s life is a reminder of the values and qualities that have drawn so many of us to the task of strengthening communities across Canada and beyond. His return 14 years ago to his home community of Lafontaine, Ontario was accompanied by a burning desire to contribute to the renewal of this small francophone village and the villages adjacent. His journey can nourish and inspire us as we continue our own work, wherever we are.Des

I met him in the 1980s at a workshop I was conducting in the Pinecrest-Queensway neighbourhood of Ottawa. Feisty was my first impression of this passionate man, an impression that was sustained, one of many qualities that shaped his remarkable contributions. Since this first meeting, where he talked my ear off about the challenges of rural revitalization in the county of Prescott-Russell, his story interweaves with many in our organization and in the broader CED and social economy networks to which so many of you readers belong.

I can recall as if yesterday heading out on the Log Train Trail, a 20 km railway grade that cuts through the farm I lived on for 34 years. He had come to kayak around Haida Gwaii but insisted on detouring to Port Alberni for a visit first. He wanted to talk about his future, his vision, his dream of going home, his determination to honour a promise he made to himself years before to bring to his village and region the knowledge and skills he had acquired over many years of work across the globe.

By the time we returned from several hours of intense discussion and distracted hiking, the plan he had come to hatch started to take shape. Raymond became an associate of our organization and we targeted the CED Technical Assistance Program for a grant. We got it and he proceeded to use it as seed money to organize a community development corporation controlled and owned by the francophone community, CALDECH. It may just be one of the best investments CEDTAP ever made.

Little did any of us know the marathon of struggle and sacrifice that would accompany the evolution, the trials, and the successes of CALDECH. It is a rich story that inspires and instructs. I have been pestering Raymond for years to write for us, to tell the stories, to reflect critically on the practice, to articulate the lessons in policy and institution building essential to scaling up our successes in rural community economic development.

But the years of work left Raymond little time for writing. A long, arduous fight he led to affirm francophone rights to equal access to federal resources for community economic development went all the way to the Supreme Court of Canada before finally succeeding. The victory left CALDECH and Raymond with few financial resources to carry on the rest of the work. Regardless, it went on, as Raymond noted in an e-mail to me last month:
“Here, there is still a great deal of work going on in spite of the lack of resources. “The Villageois is now open [a seniors facility that serves and retains citizens in their home region, Lafontaine and the surrounding villages]. We have 65% occupancy already. We are working on securing our long-term financing and getting our staff to full complement. It has been a work of almost 12 years now; meetings every Monday evening for all those years. And a great deal of work between meetings. But it is there! It is open! People are very proud of such a community asset in such a small village.“The Festival du Loup is organizing our 8th edition this summer. Aouououououou!“CALDECH has launched yet another complaint before the Commissioner of Official languages against Industry Canada. They have responded so far by accepting to negotiate. So, it is not over till it’s over!”

It is not hard to feel the enthusiastic vitality of Raymond’s leadership. Nor is it difficult to imagine the richness of the lessons embedded in the CALDECH story. He always had the desire to do the writing and was preparing, finally, to get on with it. Indeed, we were scheming in the last couple of months on a fellowship that would give him the time and space he needed. He felt very strongly that the story of CALDECH must be documented and shared. Would it not be wonderful if someone could complete the task?

Even while struggling to build and sustain the work of CALDECH Raymond was active in several other venues. He was an early supporter, member, and sometimes critic of the Canadian CED Network. He saw a need to build francophone leadership and to build more CALDECHs across Ontario. He inspired a French-language CED curriculum, a project on which he and we worked closely together, and which he later helped deliver through Collège Boréal. And he never did stop volunteering internationally. One of his most recent forays was to help build social enterprise development capacity in Mozambique.

I hesitate to try and capture such a complex and generous spirit in words, for ultimately it is not possible. But I do want to try and express something of the wonder and inspiration his life represents to those who had the privilege of sharing parts of our lives with him.

Raymond was an inspired grinder, a man who could not only see an alternative, but had the guts and perseverance to work away at the nitty-gritty until the vision was realized. Wherever he worked, he made things happen.

Raymond was an educator and organizer, a man who loved to engage people in discovering the rich vocation that lies in community building and in organizing people to defend their basic rights and human dignity.Des

Raymond was rooted in his culture yet had a huge capacity to cross over into the lives of people from very different places and perspectives. His work and his volunteering around the world testify to this.

Lastly, Raymond was a man with a grand sense of humour. He had a great capacity to express joy, a quality that has served him and others very well amidst much toil and no small amount of struggle.

So long Raymond. The tears are running down my face.

You came home. You gave so much to your community. You realized so many parts of your feisty dream. Even in death you are a living legacy.

We celebrate your life, dear friend … and carry on!

Mike Lewis
Canadian Centre for Community Renewal
April 26, 2010

The deadline for early bird registration rates has been extended to April 22, 2010. Register now to save! To register visit: www.ccednet-rcdec.ca/en/summit#registration.

After an inspiring evening with Raj Patel, Mondragon International and the United Steelworkers at the Summit opening, the first plenary panel will have leading speakers review the growth and contributions of the cooperative, community economic development and social economy sectors in Canada and around the world:

Nancy Neamtan, President and Executive Director of the Chantier de l’économie sociale, a Québec-wide network of networks brining together co-operative and non-profit enterprises, local development organizations and social movements
Cooperative historian Ian MacPherson, Principal Investigator and Co-Director of the Canadian Social Economy Hub, a five-year national research program. He is the author or editor of 17 books and numerous articles on co-operatives and other subjects and has delivered more than 300 presentations around the world.
From the Philippines, Ben Quinones, Chair of the Coalition of Socially Responsible SMEs in Asia. He chaired the First Asia Solidarity Economy Forum in Manila in October 2007 and is a member of the Intercontinental Network for the Promotion of the Social Solidarity Economy (RIPESS).

Book your travel and accommodation early! Affordable, convenient and comfortable accommodation is available on campus at Carleton University. (www.ccednet-rcdec.ca/en/summit#accommodations)

Declare your organization as part of this movement and join others in the Summit tradeshow. (www.ccednet-rcdec.ca/en/summit#tradeshow)

Did you know that Summit deliberations are already underway? FREE 1-hour telelearning sessions allow anyone interested to learn more about the summit themes and provide feedback before the event. Hear from top Canadian practitioners and researchers on the latest research and the recommendations for action being put forward at the Summit.

The next telelearning session is on Procurement and will be held April 21st at 12:00pm Pacific time, 3:00pm Eastern time. Spaces are limited; you can register by phoning 250-472-4976, or by e-mailing with your name, location, and work or volunteer position. For more information about this session and for the full schedule of sessions and speakers, see the Summit engagement web page. (www.ccednet-rcdec.ca/en/summit/engagement#telelearning)

We hope you’ll be part of the Summit!

CCEDNet’s National Policy Council is made up of CED practitioners from across the country who work to raise the profile of CED with federal, provincial and municipal governments. The Policy Council is looking for several new members to join in the work of advancing a CED policy agenda throughout Canada.

If you are interested in joining the Policy Council, please submit an expression of interest to council Chair Rosalind Lockyer () by Sept 1^st, 2010 outlining your availability, experience, particular interest in the work of CCEDNet’s Policy Council and any affiliations to national organizations.

To find out more about the council and it’s work:
http://www.ccednet-rcdec.ca/en/our_work/national_policy

In selecting council members, the council looks to ensure diverse representation from a geographic, demographic, and sectoral context.

Send expression of interest to:
Rosalind Lockyer
Canadian CED Network
Policy Council Chair

by Sept 1, 2010

The Canadian Social Economy Hub (CSEHub) and the Steering Committee for the 2010
National Summit on a People-Centred Economy are offering a series of telelearning sessions
based on two series of papers that cover four important themes within Canada. One series
is being developed as Knowledge Mobilization papers by CSEHub researchers, and the other
series has been prepared as issue papers for the National Summit.

These sessions are intended to generate engagement and learning about key issues within
Canada, to share research results, and to build momentum leading up to the National Summit
occurring in Ottawa from May 30 – June 1st.

Social Capital Financing
Wednesday, April 14th 2010, 9:00 am PST, 12:00 pm EST

Procurement
Wednesday, April 21st 2010, 12:00 pm PST, 3:00 pm EST

Enterprise Development
Wednesday, May 5th 2010, 9:00 am PST, 12:00 pm EST

NEW! Towards a Global People Centered Economy

Thursday, May 6th 2010, 9:00 am PST, 12:00 pm EST

Partnership and Movement Building
Wednesday, May 12th 2010, 9:00 am PST, 12:00 pm EST

Click here to find out how to participate

Expanding Cultural Horizons in Canada

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Marichu Antonio is the Executive Director of the Ethno-Cultural Council of Calgary (ECCC), a community-based organization comprised of more than twenty associations that makeup the collective voice of Calgary’s ethnically and culturally diverse communities; the ECCC creates social, economic and political change through collaborative action.

Marichu is also one of the founders of EthniCity Catering, which off ers high-quality, authentic multi-ethnic foods, and employment and training for immigrant women in transition. Newcomers participate in key workplace skills training in a commercial kitchen, from math and record-keeping skills to the process of finding work.

Crystal Tremblay, February 2010, PDF, 61 pages

The second paper builds on this literature review by focusing on the public policy instruments used to support the Social Economy in different jurisdictions. Specific policy instruments are identified that are being applied by governments to support the Social Economy in producing public policy outcomes that respond to the social, economic and environmental challenges they and their citizens’ face. The paper reveals an important trend of governments’ greater recognition of how organizations of the SE have applied core ideas in order to achieve socio-economic development goals that are equitable and just. Analysis is also provided of the ways in which social economy actors are working together to “co-construct” public policy. One conclusion of the paper is that where governments have fragmented or non-explicit approaches to the Social Economy and there is a lack of cohesion and collaboration amongst its across, there has been greater difficulty to maximize outcomes. There are also some important examples of public policy development within Canada and in other countries that suggest material for discussion on the future of public policy on the social economy.

Visit our research page for more information