"Lesley Crompton Tax Prep Services" provides free tax return preparation for low-income individuals and families (income <$45,000 per individual). Returns can be done virtual, drop off or in-person at the Civic Hub Waterloo Region Appointments are required for all returns and can be booked through email at lesleyacrompton@gmail.com or 519-572-2570.
The 2022 Community Wellbeing Survey preliminary results were released by the Canadian Index of Wellbeing Team, and SDC has completed its feedback report. Close 5,000 surveys were submitted, while SDC's community connectors collected over 280 responses from underrepresented and hard to reach populations. With the onset of the 2022 Wellbeing Survey process, SDCWR joined other partner organizations in mobilizing their staff and community connectors to take part in:
The Many Faces of Displacement provincial project is well on its way in collaboration with the Social Planning Network of Ontario. Each of the regions involved in the project are close to finishing gathering stories of displacement and eviction in their communities, York Region, Cornwall and Area, Kingston and Oxford County. All of the regions gather weekly to discuss the stories they are hearing and the themes that are coming up repeatedly, as well as the similarities and differences they are seeing across the regions.
The Group has completed a string of interviews to unpack current barriers and solutions to lived expertise work, such as trauma and diversity, accountability to the process by both municipal partners and lived experts, and the persisting tokenism. The Working Group members are proud and enthusiastic about co-creating the approach being used and have identified even more opportunities to keep improving the process and the collaboration with municipal staff and councils.
We may not need another research on homelessness and supports to homeless in Waterloo Region for a long time. A lot has been said and remains ignored to the large extent today. The project we are starting in collaboration with the Region of Waterloo with Prof. Brian Doucet at University of Waterloo and Prof. Laura Pin from Wilfrid Laurier University is rooted in participatory action research approach. Contradiction? The reason we are grounding it in self-reflective approaches, participatory methods and prototyping is to allow for the lived experience voices to be heard, responded to and their wisdom actioned upon by the regional and city governments. After the January court ruling on the 100 Victoria encampment, there is a greater recognition of the violations of the human rights to shelter, safety and life, we wish to contribute to a greater awareness of the urgency to act in collaboration with lived experts on initiatives similar to the hybrid shelter in Waterloo or access to warming centres during weekends and holidays. Together with the partners on this project we hope to do this work with, not for, the people who gained invaluable insight and resilience through struggle, hardship and ongoing criminalization. As the project evolves through the regional planning to end chronic homelessness, take a listen of the podcast Prof. Brian Doucet recorded with Beyond the Bulletin.
“The Upstream Fund has the potential to shift the balance of power in our Region, and begin to prevent harm before it happens” said Community Change Committee Member Pamela Fehr.
Social Development Centre's Civic Hub program is among 41 groups and organizations who received funding through the Upstream Fund in 2023. Revival of Civic Hub partner groups self-governance, financial capacity and anti-oppression, anti-racism practices will be the focus of our team's work to incubate and nurture community-based grassroots initiatives. 
When it comes to work, face to face or virtually, our associates and staff deserve to feel valued, supported and inspired. The slowdown time is offered regularly throughout the year, and we are offering a week before Christmas as a slowdown week for planning and reflection, and the week after Christmas, as a paid holiday at the Social Development Centre. Staff self-care and time to disconnect contribute to a nurturing environment. We wish you all equally supportive and energizing holiday time before we meet afresh in 2023!
"I Am Not Invisible", an open event at the Kitchener Public Library, organized by Disabilities and Human Rights Group, complements a range of activities in the three cities on December 3rd, the UN International Day of Persons with Disabilities. This panel discussion will shine a light on the living experience of young people with invisible disabilities, their challenges, successes, and accomplishments. KPL Central Branch, at the auditorium, 1pm-2:30pm, Join this important conversation!
Through our work we are in frequent tension with oppressive systems that are our collective legacy of the colonialization. We exist within these oppressive systems, we are sometimes oppressed by them, we are sometimes made complicit by them. Read the full statement made on November 8th 2022, at the opening night "In The Penal Colony" with MJ Drama and the local actor Kevin White at the Registry Theater.
The concerns about Bill 23, the "More Homes Built Faster Act” continue to grow. Municipalities across Ontario have expressed deep reservations about its impact, especially right after the elections. Social Development Centre and other organizations in the province identified a range of concerns regarding measures that will actually prevent creation of the affordable hosuing we need. The Bill will: cut funding to municipal affordable housing programs (read more), reduce the amount of affordable housing new developments have to provide through inclusionary zoning, undermine programs that protect existing affordable housing and tenants rights, shift taxes from developers to ordinary households and municipal revenues. Read the letter to the Ontario Government that many organizations in Ontario are signing to ask the province to address these concerns. Please take a moment to sign the letter on behalf of your organization, and pass this along to your networks. Affordable housing is too important and we can't afford to get it wrong.
© Social Development Centre Waterloo Region
23 Water St N, Kitchener, ON Canada N2H 5A4
519-579-3800 | 1-877-579-3859 | sdcwr@waterlooregion.org
Charitable Number: 107987166RR0001