About Us

The Social Development Centre Waterloo Region (SDC) was incorporated in 1967 after years of local mobilizing around community identified gaps in services, especially for youth and families. Over the years, we have incubated countless community projects, service activities, groups, and non-profits. Today our primary pillars are Housing & Homelessness, Grassroots Infrastructure, and Lived Expertise. Our service programs include Civic Hub Waterloo Region, Eviction Prevention Peer Support, Lived Expertise Support, and Festival of Neighbourhoods.

Want to know more? Get to know our team and contact us for more information. SDC's charitable registration number is 107987166RR0001.

Our Vision

Fair and equitable access to social, economic, and political life for everyone in Waterloo Region.

Our Mandate

The Social Development Centre Waterloo Region is a learning organization that supports all voices in the creation of community wide solutions, ensuring that lived experience is the basis for collective action towards change in policies and service delivery.

Our Goals 2022-2024 

At the 2022 Annual General Meeting, our priorities have been validated with the following four directions: 

  • Lived experience has access to information and opportunities to share their knowledge and participate in decision-making
  • Lived expertise voices are heard and incorporated in development and implementation of local strategies and services, especially in the area of housing and income security
  • Grassroots organizations and groups have access to space, resources and supports they need to operate and grow through the Civic Hub Waterloo Region
  • Social Development Centre is resilient, healthy, adaptable and accountable to its members, the people and the communities it serves.

Our Priority Actions 

  • Designing collaborative approaches to research and planning that draw policy lessons from lived expertise through anti-racism, anti-oppression and intersectionality.
  • Ongoing planning and service delivery in the area of housing and homelessness prevention to ensure the human right to housing in Waterloo Region 
  • Supporting grassroots and small nonprofits through programs at the Civic Hub Waterloo Region such as the Shared Platform charitable partnerships and cross sector collaboration of equity seeking groups.
  • Development of the social enterprise that will ensure trauma informed support and decent compensation for persons from groups that have traditionally had challenges in entering the job market and receiving decent compensation for their work in the community. 

Read the Strategic Plan 2021-2024 (developed in 2021 and revised annually).

Meet our Board

Board of Directors 2024-2025 elected at the June 13th, 2024 Annual General Meeting:

Heather Bigelow, President
Meagan Snyder, Secretary
Nathan Pike, Treasurer
Brad Ullner, Past President
Laura Hamilton, Director
Leah Young,  Director
Udanapher (Nadine) Green, Director
Rachel Bair, Director

Interested in joining our Board? Your space is still open!

Our Values

We embody the phrase "nothing about us without us." We believe that lived experience should be the basis for policy and decision-making, and that grassroots and community-based solutions are the foundation of social justice and collective action.

Our Operating Principles

Community We focus on geographic community where we find issues and seek solutions. We acknowledge and work with communities of interest as ways people come together to improve quality of life.

Accountability We are accountable to the community and seek direction from those who use our services and from our membership. Our governing board is elected annually by community members.

Independence Being community-driven and accountable, we have greater freedom than public sector organizations or direct service providers, to critique existing policies and systems or to propose alternatives.

Knowledge-based Action We link independent research and lived community experience to the development of action proposals and solutions to identified problems that eliminate inequity and injustice.

Equity and Inclusion We aim to engage everyone, especially those who voices are not typically heard. When we do engage we will be mindful of how we do this to be as inclusive as possible.

Collaboration We work in partnership and interdependency with others to share resources, skills and expertise.

Land Acknowledgement

Social Development Centre Waterloo Region acknowledges that we are working on the traditional shared lands of the Mississauga of the Credit Anishinabeg of the Three Fires Confederacy, the Haudenosaunee of the Six Nations, and the Chonnonton peoples. We honor their original claim to these lands and the legacy of the first displaced peoples. The territory we are on is Block 2 of the Haldimand Tract, which is Six Nations of the Grand River territory that was stolen through governmental and financial fraud.

In April 2021, nine months into the land reclamation by the people at 1492 Land Back Lane, the Haudenosaunee Confederacy Chiefs Council announced a moratorium on development within the entire Haldimand Tract. It is our responsibility to call out the dispossession of the land and demand the collaboration of all levels of government to work out agreements based on the Haudenosaunee Development Protocol.

Our comittment to restitution and reconciliation, shared on November 8 2022 at the opening of "In The Penal Colony" at the Registry Theater.

Our History & Legacy of Impact

The idea to create a social planning council emerged in the 1950's when local leaders recognized the need for more social services, especially for youth and families with young children, as well as reliable information management to respond to changing needs in the community. Social Planning Council Kitchener-Waterloo was incorporated as a charity in 1967 (charitable number #107987166RR0001).

Craving some history? 

In the early years, volunteers did the work at the Council, addressing the needs of youth, families, seniors and persons with different abilities. As immigration brought greater diversity, settlement support was in greater demand. Our continuing concern about the issues faced by these and other marginalized members of our community, such as income inequities and homelessness have been a beacon shedding light on unresolved gaps in services and policy, as well as illuminating future trends and opportunities.

Today, SDC has a long legacy of impact on policy and service delivery:

● Community Information Centre of WR
● ConnectKW, a network of public Internet sites
● Meet-the-Candidates, unique participatory forums creating a space for exchange and dialogue
● Visitable Housing WR framework in collaboration with planners and builders
● Decent Lives Framework to show how strong neighbourhoods create opportunities for everyone
● Poverty Free Action Group bringing together social services, unions, and people with lived experience together in action and advocacy

● Wellbeing Waterloo Region 

● Living Wage Waterloo Region

● Festival of Neighoburhoods 

Many organizations that are now integral to our community evolved through this inclusive approach:

● Food Bank of Waterloo Region
● OneROOF
● Waterloo Region Community Legal Services
● KW AccessAbility
● Meals on Wheels and more...
● Volunteer Action Centre of KW and Area

Health of our Organization

Bylaws 2016 - Changes to the Bylaws adopted at the 2023 Annual General Meeting
Our compliance with the Ontario Non Profit Corporations Act has been completed, and the articles of incorporation created in 1967 with outmost foresight remain unchanged.

2023 Activity Report - Financial Report 2023 (audited financial statement)
2022 Activity Report - Financial Report 2022(review engagement)
2021 Activity Report - Financial Report 2021 (review engagement)
2020 Activity Report - 2020 Financial Report
2019 Activity Report, 2019 Financial Report
2018 Activity Report, 2018 Financial Report
2017 Activity Report, 2017 Financial Report 
2016 Annual Activity Report Presentation, 
2016 Financial Summary Report 
2015 Annual Report Presentation
2014 Annual Activity Report Presentation
2013 Annual Report

Oral History Project 2017-2019 

Oral History Project

 The Oral History Project project was initiated in 2017 in collaboration with the Commons Studio and will continue thanks to the passionate community members who want to preserve stories and accounts about the 50 year's long community development legacy. Do you have a story to tell? You know people who we should talk to?

Our Affiliations

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