Thank you very much for your continued support for the work we do. We have had a busy year and for those of you who were not able to attend the AGM, we have attached our annual report so you can see what we were up to during the 2017/2018 fiscal year.  

This is the first time we held our AGM in September since changing our by-laws at the 2017 AGM. This was done simply to ease the workload for Cindy Hoover, our office manager, given the amount of growth and many varied funding sources that all need separate financial reporting and Cindy is our accounting maven!

The AGM was well attended and included a discussion on opening Portage and Main in the lead up to the plebiscite. The idea was to provide more nuance to the discussion as there did seem to be such a gut reaction to the issue. SPCW has long called for the opening of the intersection based on our commitment to full social inclusion by improving access for all. Unfortunately the accessibility issues along with the facts that about half of the 12 million budgeted would go towards improving public transit, and that the barriers would be coming down for repairs anyway, amongst all the other salient points got lost in the ‘din’ of the municipal election. The results of the plebiscite were clear though, as the map shows. Those who live and breath in the area want it open while those who simply want to drive through it, want it kept closed. Let’s hope that now that the election is over, we can have a more reasoned discussion.

As always, our work is hard to encapsulate in brief but all that is outlined in our annual report and more is ongoing and making progress. For example, our work on MPHM’s Winnipeg Without Poverty has seen the Executive Policy Committee ask for a report on what the City is already doing about poverty and asking for recommendations on what more it can do. It does also seem like the City will finally be adopting a low-income bus pass!

We are also now looking at ‘rebooting’ CityWatch and are currently consulting with community partners on what they would find helpful for their work.

We did say farewell to Christina Mae Nino this past summer as she moved on to become an executive director in her own right. The Manitoba Not For Profit Housing Association is very lucky to have her! We were able to find Albert Boakye to step in as one of our two  community animators. 

While our other community animator, Josh Brandon, wasn’t successful in his first run for political office, he ran a great campaign for City Council and came closer than anyone else who was challenging an incumbent. We wished him well but we are also very happy to have him back!

And finally, we are turning 100 in 2019! There will be much talk of the General Strike’s 100th, of course, but we are also working on highlighting our work with a documentary that we will show at our next AGM and while we cannot yet announce names, on April 26th 2019, we are planning a powerhouse panel on the role of social justice in the next 100 years so stay tuned for more details!

All the best,
Kate Kehler,
Executive Director
Social Planning Council of Winnipeg