Community Development Framework Working DocumentSt James Town Toronto

RESIDENT ENGAGEMENT AND COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT

"Community development is a structured intervention that gives communities greater control over the conditions that affect their lives. This does not solve all the problems faced by a local community, but it does build up confidence to tackle such problems as effectively as any local action can. Community development works at the level of local groups and communities rather than with individuals or families. The range of local groups and organizations representing communities at local level constitutes thecommunity sector. Community development is a skilled process and part of its approach is the belief that communities cannot be helped unless they themselves agree to this process. Community development has to look both ways: not only at how the community is working at the grass roots, but also at how responsive key institutions are to the needs of local communities". - A Statement from theCommunity Development Foundation (UK)

RESIDENT ENGAGEMENT AND COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENTNorth St. James Town CommunityThe neighbourhood of North St. James Town in Toronto is the community lies in the northeast corner of the downtown Toronto area. The term Residents used in this document refers to the residents living in the neighbourhood covers the area bounded by Sherbourne Street to the west, Bloor Street to the north, Parliament Street to the east, and Wellesley Street East to the south. It is the largest high-rise community in Canada. It consists of 19 high-rise buildings (14 to 32 stories). These massive residential towers were built in the 1960s. Approximately 17,800 people live in the neighbourhoods, making it Canadas most densely populated community and one of the most thickly populated neighbourhood anywhere in North America. More than fifty five percentage of the community members are at the age between 24 54 and living with their family. Community DevelopmentThe term development often carries the assumption of size, expansion or growth. Community Development means the self-reliance capacity of the community or an increasing respect for reducing outside dependencies. The term development also depicts the process of building social infrastructure, such as developing Self-Governed Groups, creating residence councils or constituting Community Based Organization (CBO). St. James Town Community Engagement Council (Working Group)St. James Town Community Engagement Council is a creative and collaborative space for supporting community-driven initiatives, bringing neighbours together, and develops an action plan for building positive change in St. James Town. When the residents realized that community engagement builds social capital, social ties, problem solutions, and support which are associated with a better community cohesion and well-being, they take the responsibility of creating alliances and partnerships with existing organizations, builds trust and mechanisms for joint action. The council is a community-agency collaboration where 12 residents and 3 organizations are working together to ensure that St. James Town is being recognized as a safe, healthy, vibrant, prosperous and economically viable place to live, where all residents can fully participate in the life of the community.Current Council MembersResidentsFacilitating Organization

1. Shaheen Kauser2. Chelladurai Yogarajah 3. Tommy Huang4. Rasathi Yogarajah 5. Chika Griffiths 6. Charles Purdey 7. Amna Shah8. Gabilan Sivapatham 9. Madhu Rampal10. Vacant11. Vacant12. Vacant

1. Anish Alex (The Yonge Street Mission), 2. Diana Mavunduse (Dixon Hall), Supporting Staff1. Kurt Aydiner (SJT Community Corner)2. Laheeb (SJT Community Corner) 3. Nisreen Al-Khatib (SJT Community Corner)

Action Plan for 2015-2016Step 1:Meet two times in a month. Discuss issues, opportunities, priorities and resources.

Step 2:Identify potential community engagement initiatives and community development projects which may address some of the existing problems.

Step 3:Engage more people: Ensure community participation/support for identified community engagement initiatives

Step 4:Engage more people through Asset Mapping: - Identify Gift, Talents, Skills, Knowledge and Passion of the people. Create a Talent inventory of Peoples.

Step 5:Identify and organize people who are interested, talented, and knowledgeable. Plan next level of engagement.

Step 6:Create Groups/networks based on interest, talent and Knowledge. Create new leaderships. Economic opportunity plan.

Step 7:Team Building, mutual trust and respect.

Step 8:Action plan for each group Project Development Grand Proposal

Step 9:Identify funding and Project Implementation Sustainability Plan

Step 10:Evaluation and Learning

1: MeetingsSt. James Town Community Engagement Council start meeting on March 2015. The meetings are held at Community Corner, Room B, on every other Tuesdays. The meetings are structured, and the members discuss issues, opportunities, priorities and plans. The membership is open until it fills all the vacant resident positions. The group decided to be strategic in terms of membership that allow members to have a similar community development perspective. The group is still working on its structure and procedures. 1.1: Problem IdentificationSt. James Town Community Engagement Council identified the problems facing by the community members based on their years of experience working with the local community in different leadership roles. The group also reviewed various community consultation reports and studies to get more clarity on what is bothering the residents. Though there are several issues the council decided to address two major issues.i. Lack of resident engagementii. Employment and Income security

2: Potential community engagement initiativesThe group has identifies several potential community engagement initiatives which they can take up and engage community in a wider level. One of the challenge was how to address employment and income security while engaging the community. A final list of potential initiatives yet to be confirmed. The ideas/initiatives came out from the brainstorming sessions are illustrated below. The group decided to engage residents to express their opinion/support on these ideas, and take more ideas from them.2.1: List of potential community engagement initiatives1Community Social Action Group13Fresh food share group

2Community Kitchen 14Youth Group

3Community Garden 15Womens Group

4Community Recycling Program 16Mens group

5Community Gym 17Seniors Group

6Community Sewing Group 18Community Arts Group

7Community Tutoring (K-12)19Hair & Beauty Group

8Seniors Income generation group20Technology/Computer Edu group

9Single Parent Group 21Child Minding group

10Community Safety projects

11Community Info/News Letter

12Jewelry making group

3: Asset Mapping and Community SurveyThe group is in this stage at present. The group may conduct a community wide survey and asset mapping for Engagement the community in a large level to inform them about this movement Develop a collective opinion/support on community engagement initiatives Mobilize people around the emerged ideas Identify more engagement initiatives/ideas Identify Gift, Talents, Skills, Knowledge and Passion of the people. Create an evidence based best practice in the community engagement efforts Let the community know there are opportunities to involve based on their talent and skills Develop a community talent inventory profile Navigate community interest to the existing/new initiatives

Theory of ChangeIt is a road map which provides an idea where we are now and where we want to go. This theory of change is based on the conceptual understanding about how and why this capacity building model community development strategy will work in SJT. Resident Engagements StagesPassiveParticipationEmpowermentLeadership

EngagementLevel 1Identify existing leaders Residents drop some ideas, share some thoughts or issues, critique some programs, may ask some questions. Resident doubtful about the whole process

Identify people with similar interest

One-to-one relations

Need creation

EngagementLevel 2Group Formation.Residents drop specific ideas, share their thoughts around this ideas or issues, may ask some questions about the processResidents actively participate in discussions, formulate ideas, raise problems and suggest solutions

Discussion on Community Engagement

Engagement Level 3Capacity BuildingResidents actively participating to solve the identified issues/ formulated ideas, and suggest solutionsThe group take some initiatives. SPN build capacity and support those groupsIdentify new leadership and some capacity building initiatives

Engaging more people

Engagement Level 4Action.People create groups/network based on their interest, talent and skillsIndividuals take initiatives for their economic growth.Leaders will take initiatives for Small projects and speak for the community. Intentional Capacity Building initiatives

Each group/network write projects for grand

Opportunity Engagement councils discuss the coordination plans/project

Funding

Capacity building.All the partner agencies supporting different initiatives based on their capacity and interestAll the network/group members create Community Development Council Developed CapacityCommunity led organization. Elected leadership. Sustainability

Community Based Organization by residentsCommunity Development Council

ConclusionThis movement focuses on socio-economic engagement, new initiatives on social development, an improved participation in making decisions affecting to the community, and an improved healthy lives and/or vibrant community. Besides this initiative also intended to gather information relevant to the existing programs and services and identify key advocacy areas. 8

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