Despite a significant increase in funding over the last five years to address women’s homelessness in Hamilton, the crisis persists with seemingly no end in sight.
Funded by: Federal government’s Homelessness Partnering Strategy administered by the City of Hamilton, United Way Halton & Hamilton
Building Opportunities: Advancing Women in Non-Traditional Occupations was a three year project led by YWCA Hamilton in partnership with Workforce Planning Hamilton (WPH). The project was designed to research, understand, and communicate the barriers and opportunities for women in Hamilton, Ontario who are working towards, or established in, non-traditional occupations. YWCA Hamilton engaged the Social Planning and Research Council of Hamilton to conduct the evaluation of the project. Stakeholders shared that the resulting toolkit is especially important for small to medium sized enterprises. The resulting website offers readily available tools that can be easily copied and pasted into a company’s policies and procedures. Companies that employ tradespeople will find that the toolkit offers easy-to-use resources that cover stages from pre-hiring, retention, and advancement opportunities.
Funded by: Status of Women Canada
Using a variety of data sources, the Demographic shifts series of Hamilton’s Social Landscape bulletins explore differences between older and younger generations to uncover trends in a range of demographic characteristics of Hamilton’s population.
See previous Hamilton’s Social Landscape Bulletins
Funded by: United Way of Burlington and Greater Hamilton
This report is phase two of the “Mapping Community Assets” report recently produced by the Woman Abuse Working Group. It is intended to provide a baseline system overview of intimate partner violence and sexual violence of adult women.
Goals of this report include:
Community Partners: Woman Abuse Working Group
Funded by: Ontario Women’s Directorate
The federal election is on October 19, 2015. Use Canada Votes to help spark dialogue about social issues in Canada and put them on the public agenda.
On October 19, 2015 Canadians will come together to choose the direction of policy in this country for the next 4 years. Democracy works best when citizens engage in dialogue about the society in which we want to live. Canada Votes is a tool to help spark dialogue about social issues in Canada. The federal government has a role to play in addressing them – and you can help by talking about the social issues that matter to you and asking questions to find out what will be done.
With Canada Votes you can:
THIS SERIES WAS PRODUCED BY: Canadian Council on Social Development, Community Development Council Durham, Community Development Halton, Edmonton Social Planning Council, Saint John Human Development Council,Social Planning and Research Council of BC, Social Planning and Research Council of Hamilton, Social Planning Council of Cambridge and North Dumfries, Social Planning Council of Kitchener-Waterloo, Social Planning Network of Ontario, and Social Planning Toronto.
Social planning organizations across the country are helping to strengthen communities and work on social justice issues. We also recognize the need to work together around key issues affecting our communities. We have come together to provide this publication on the federal election because we believe that democracy works best when citizens engage in dialogue on important issues.
Click here for reference materials and additional language translations.
This short report gives overview of demographics of Hamilton’s Aboriginal residents in other to better understand this important community. The report highlights a growing youth population, a large age group in the 45-49 year age group, possibly due to the “Sixties Scoop”, as well as education, occupations and income. Finally the report ends with some data from a recent survey of Aboriginal people experiencing homelessness in Hamilton.
Funded by: United Way of Burlington & Greater Hamilton and Service Canada
This Profile of North Hamilton describes the trends and conditions within North Hamilton, including the North End and Keith neighbourhoods. The report was commissioned by North Hamilton Community Health Centre and the Hughson Street Baptist Church. This profile will inform NHCHC’s Board of Directors’ strategic planning process as they chart the future directions of the NHCHC to fulfill its mission “to enable health through healing, hope and wellness” and realize its vision of “no obstacles to health”. The Profile of North Hamilton reveals a community of resilience, a community facing challenges, and a community poised with opportunities.
Community Partners: North Hamilton Community Health Centre and the Hughson Street Baptist Church
This Resource Map provides an inventory of Violence Against Women Services in Hamilton.
Community Partners: Woman Abuse Working Group
Funded by: Ontario Women’s Directorate
This report is the result of a consultation process initiated by the City of Hamilton (Housing Division) and involving the Women’s Housing Planning Collaborative (WHPC). WHPC exists to develop, coordinate, advocate for and facilitate a gender specific, comprehensive and seamless system of services to meet these stated needs.
Funded by: City of Hamilton
Community Partner: Women’s Housing Planning Collaborative
For over a decade in Hamilton there have been various tables and task forces established to address the reality of street level sex work and its impact on neighbourhoods from various angles. From The Barton Street Community Partners for Crime Prevention (2003) to the Sex Trade Task Force (2003 – 2008) and now the current Sex Work Engagement Project Team, (2011-present), many community partners have come together in various configurations over the years to address this issue.
This report summarizes the evaluation of the YWCA Hamilton’s Financial Literacy Program, which aimed to reach 80 disadvantaged women in the course of developing a model for financial literacy and training that could be incorporated into existing programs. The evaluation examined program effectiveness, adaptability/viability, and partnerships.
Funded by: YWCA Hamilton, TD Financial Literacy Grant
Improved unemployment rates, a booming real estate market and an influx of young adults are proof of Hamilton’s “economic renaissance,” but the prosperity has not reached across the city, says a new report from Hamilton Community Foundation.
Hamilton’s Vital Signs report for example, that rents have risen by over four percent in one year and rental vacancy rates have dropped to an unhealthy level of 1.8 percent, foreshadowing a looming housing crisis. Unemployment rates are better than the provincial average, but some 57 percent of Hamilton’s workers are in “insecure employment” with less access to benefits and pensions, the highest rate across the GHTA.
“This Vital Signs report reaffirms many reasons for the city’s new sense of energy and optimism,” said Terry Cooke, President & CEO, “but also that disparity remains a critical issue. Many Hamiltonians still struggle to secure basics such as safe, affordable housing, secure jobs and an income above the poverty line.”
Funded by: Hamilton Community Foundation
The goals of this evaluation of the YWCA Hamilton’s Bridging Internationally Trained Individuals Program are to explore and offer recommendations for strengthening several elements of the program, including the effectiveness of recruitment and marketing strategies, partnerships, participant commitment, differences in employment between streams, relative merits of a community agency delivering the program, and eligibility requirements. The YWCA Hamilton’s Bridging Internationally Trained Individuals Program aimed to provide training and support for Internationally Educated Persons (IEPs) to bridge soft skills, communications, and cultural awareness issues as well as identify and access opportunities for technical upgrading to improve employability in the environmental and information and communications technology (ICT) sectors.
This report provides an evaluation of the Building Better Futures program run through the Neighbour 2 Neighbour Centre. The purpose of this evaluation has been to illuminate project outcomes, key findings and lessons learned, opportunities for improvement, and implications for the project’s future.
Funded by: Status of Women Canada
Community Partners: Neighbour 2 Neighbour Centre
This report is about services to help homeless women in Hamilton, including statistics on the first 18 months of the Supporting our Sisters project in partnership with the Women’s Housing Planning Collaborative. Read more »
Funded by: United Way of Burlington & Greater Hamilton, City of Hamilton, and Government of Canada
This local evaluation of the Community Action Program for Children (CAPC) uses numerical data from program partners to identify numbers of sub-groups of participants and visits within each program, and presents stories from program partners about ways that their programs are making a difference in individual families’ lives, as well as challenges or unexpected outcomes. Findings suggest that continued collaboration could help partners to address common challenges such as reaching out to newcomer communities, young fathers, and socially isolated clients; recruiting, coaching, and mentoring volunteers; and finding supports for community members seeking a service that is unknown or unavailable.
Funded by: Public Health Agency of Canada
This bulletin shows that youth aged 20-24 in the Hamilton CMA have seen a 50% decline in their employment earnings since 1976, largely due to your workers facing more precarity in the labour market. While the City of Hamilton’s youth unemployment rate is still high, Hamilton’s rate out-performed all other communities during the most recent recession. This is the sixth in a series of occasional bulletins that focus on issues highlighted in the Hamilton’s Social Landscape report and bring attention to more recent trends.
This is the fifth in a series of occasional bulletins that focus on issues highlighted in the Hamilton’s Social Landscape report and bring attention to more recent trends. This report shows that the since 1993, women have been responsible for 100% of the full-time, full-year job growth in Hamilton. But the gap between men and women’s full-time, full-year pay is larger than it was in 1976.
This is the fourth in a series of occasional bulletins that focus on issues highlighted in the Hamilton’s Social Landscape report and bring attention to more recent trends. This report shows that the Hamilton CMA’s working age employment rate has recovered quickly from the last recession. But there has been more growth in part-time, part-year, and seasonal work than in full-time, full-year work in the last few decades.
This is the third in a series of occasional bulletins that focus on issues highlighted in the Hamilton’s Social
Landscape report and bring attention to more recent trends.
This report shows that Hamilton’s unemployment rate has recovered quickly from the last recession. The report suggests ways to further improve Hamilton’s economy such as investing in childcare programs, attracting more skilled immigrants to Hamilton and making Hamilton a living wage community. Read more »
Funded by: United Way of Burlington & Greater HamiltonThis purposes of this evaluation of the Hamilton Community Action Program for Children (CAPC) program are to 1) assess the long-term impacts of CAPC in east Hamilton since 1993; and 2) offer recommendations for program improvement. A mix of quantitative and qualitative methods were used to build this assessment. Findings suggest that the program has contributed to generally improving outcomes for young children in east Hamilton, and that community organizations collaborate with one another more because of CAPC’s work.
Funded by: Public Health Agency of CanadaThis is the first in a series of occasional bulletins that focus on issues highlighted in the Hamilton’s Social
Landscape report and bring attention to more recent trends.
The United Way commissioned the SPRC to complete a set of demographic profiles of some of Hamilton’s neighbourhoods, as to aid the United Way of Burlington & Greater Hamilton and its agencies and stakeholders to better understand the neighbourhoods they are serving.
The profiles in this report are meant to give some highlights of the demographic, income and health data available for these neighbourhoods. The selected indicators are based on a large part of what service providers often ask the SPRC for when preparing strategic plans or grant proposals: age breakdowns, poverty rates, cultural diversity, educational attainment and housing, as well as health outcomes.
Funded by: United Way of Burlington & Greater Hamilton Community Partner: United Way Reference CommitteeTo aid the United Way and service providers to better understand the neighbourhoods they are serving, the SPRC was asked to complete a set of profiles of some of Hamilton’s neighbourhoods. This profile is the most in-depth in the series, but still only captures a small part of the assets and challenges within the McQuesten neighbourhood. Demographic information about the ten other neighbourhoods that are part of the city’s Neighbourhood Action Strategy is available in the Neighbourhood Profiles report.
Funded by: United Way of Burlington & Greater HamiltonThis report begins with an overview of population characteristics and a summary analysis of key trends affecting Hamilton’s downtown. This is followed by an overview of health and future growth potential in Hamilton’s downtown. Finally, after this narrative section, a summary of charts that form a profile of the downtown area is presented. The data is mainly drawn from Statistics Canada’s 2006 census, along with more recent health data from Hamilton’s Code Red series, as well as high school completion data from this same series.
Commissioned by: Hamilton Urban Community Health CentreIn Hamilton, 30,000 people are working and still living in poverty. How is this possible? It used to be that if someone was having a tough time making ends meet, the simple answer was “get a job”. However, it has become increasingly difficult to find employment with adequate wages to lift workers above the poverty line.
Funded by: United Way of Burlington & Greater HamiltonConsultations about what a living wage should include were conducted in public forums and workshops across Hamilton, since the launch of the living wage campaign in 2006. Over 600 Hamiltonians participated in these events, and many completed sample budgets to indicate what they would or would not include in a living wage budget. To calculate a specific living wage for Hamilton, generalized budgets were developed based on trustworthy data sources about actual living expenses in Hamilton.
Funded by: United Way of Burlington & Greater Hamilton Community Partner: Living Wage Group of the Hamilton Roundtable for Poverty Reduction, Living Wage Calculation Sub-CommitteeThe United Way of Burlington and Greater Hamilton requested that the SPRC prepare a report on Hamilton seniors to give the United Way and the community a picture of how Hamilton’s seniors are faring. The collaboration on this report included the Hamilton Council on Aging, who helped guide and improve this report.
Funded by: United Way of Burlington & Greater HamiltonThis report focuses primarily on groups or social issues for which data is already collected and relatively accessible. There are many groups of Hamilton residents for which there is a scarcity of data, but yet still require attention by the community to improve conditions for all. These would include many significant segments of our society including: the lesbian, bisexual, gay, transgender and queer community, precarious workers, temporary foreign workers and grandparents raising their grandchildren, among others.
Funded by: United Way of Burlington & Greater HamiltonThis report was commissioned by Mission Services of Hamilton and attempts to give at least a partial picture of the challenges and conditions faced by homeless women in Hamilton with the aim of aiding Mission Services to better understand this population and plan for potential additional services.
Commissioned by: Mission Services of Hamilton Funded by: United Way of Burlington & Greater Hamilton, Ontario Trillium FoundationThe goal of the Our Health Counts (OHC) project was to work in partnership with Aboriginal organizational stakeholders to develop a baseline population health database for urban Aboriginal people living in Ontario that is immediately accessible, useful, and culturally relevant to local, small region, and provincial policy makers.
Community Partner: City of HamiltonThe purpose of this evaluation is to explore the nature of issues related to housing and student nutrition programs as they relate to child development and well-being in East Hamilton. This evaluation integrates an independent evaluation of the Hamilton Partners in Nutrition program in the Community Action Program for Children (CAPC) area into a broader evaluation focusing on housing issues. The research supports recommendations for improving housing conditions in the CAPC catchment area, and improving Partners in Nutrition and CAPC programs more generally to enhance healthy child development.
Funded by: Public Health Agency of CanadaThe Social Planning Network of Ontario’s (SPNO) report provides valuable information about Ontario and its evolving communities. Chalk-full of demographic and socio-economic data, the report is offered as a resource for program planning, needs assessments, advocacy initiatives, public policy development, research projects and more.
Community Partner: Social Planning Network of OntarioSince the SPRC published its first report on women and poverty in Hamilton in May 2006, women remain disproportionately affected by poverty in our community. This report is an update of the 2006 report using more recent data from Statistics Canada.
Funded by: United Way of Burlington & Greater HamiltonThe City of Hamilton and the SPRC collaborated to produce this report which tracks various indicators of homelessness, particularly emergency shelter data.
Community Partner: City of Hamilton – Housing and Homelessness DivisionThis report is the result of a day spent listening deeply to and reflecting upon the stories told by remarkable people with lived experience of poverty who came forward to be a part of the Hamilton Social Audit on April 22, 2010.
Community Partner: 25 in 5 Hamilton Network for Poverty ReductionThe Hamilton Community Action Program for Children (CAPC) is a national project with each province developing its own set of priorities and guidelines. In Ontario, there are ninety-two CAPC programs currently operating. This report is an evaluation of the Hamilton CAPC project for the April 2008 to March 2010 time period.
Funded by: Public Health Agency of CanadaThis report describes the process and findings of a study undertaken to conduct a community needs assessment of the trends, issues and unmet needs of people using the current array of community based corrections services providing support to clients in Hamilton. The impetus for this study comes from the expressed concern of a number of those agencies providing support to clients in their transition from incarceration to reintegration into the Hamilton community.
Funded by: Ontario Trillium Foundation Community Partner: Corrections Consortium of HamiltonA small neighborhood in East Hamilton bound by Centennial Parkway, Barton, Queenston Road, and Lake Avenue Park, right next to the border between Stoney Creek and the original Hamilton, Riverdale West is home to a vibrant mix of citizens from around the world.
Community Partner: Community Action Program for ChildrenThese Community Profiles have been developed to aid in understanding the unique social characteristics important to, yet distinct about, each community within the City of Hamilton. This series of reports will look at a number of demographic variables across each community within the City of Hamilton.
Funded by: United Way of Burlington & Greater HamiltonThe purpose of this research was to develop a better understanding of local child care needs from the perspectives of key stakeholders, and to identify innovative strategies that complement the existing child care system and meet current needs.
Funded by: Ontario Trillium Foundation Community Partner: Today’s Family Early Learning and Child CareAs part of an anti-racism organizational change initiative, the Catholic Children’s Aid Society of Hamilton (CCAS) partnered with the SPRC. The role of the SPRC in this partnership was to consult with CCAS staff, management, volunteers, foster parents, directors, and members of racially and culturally diverse communities. The purpose of these consultations was to invite input and feedback about current policies and practices of the CCAS, and to consider how these policies and practices could be more inclusive.
Commissioned by: Catholic Children’s Aid Society of HamiltonThis report is an evaluation of the three year project led by the Street Youth Planning Collaborative and based on the 27 recommendations in the 2005 Addressing the Needs of Street Involved and Homeless Youth in Hamilton report. It reflects the project’s status as of June 30, 2009 when the community research was completed.
Funded by: Government of CanadaThe report provides an overview of the methodology used in the study, the evolution and operation of the Under the Willows program, and findings from consultations with key stakeholders. A set of conclusions are also included, based on a synthesis of findings.
Funded by: Ontario Trillium FoundationThe data and analysis from this report shows both signs of hope and signs of concern for Hamilton’s fight against poverty.
Funded by: United Way of Burlington & Greater Hamilton, Ontario Trillium FoundationIn 2008, the Homelessness Partnership Initiative (HPI) provided funding to The Catholic Children’s Aid Society of Hamilton (CCAS) in partnership with The Children’s Aid Society of Hamilton (CAS) and the Street Youth Planning Collaborative for a three-pronged project- 1) supporting two transitional housing projects for street-involved and parenting youth, 2) providing aftercare support to youth in the community to help maintain housing and 3) to develop a community plan for reducing the risk of street-involvement for former youth in care. This report reflects the final result of the third prong.
Funded by: Homelessness Partnering Initiative Community Partner: Street Youth Planning CollaborativeThese Community Profiles have been developed to aid in understanding the unique social characteristics important to, yet distinct about, each community within the City of Hamilton. This series of reports will look at a number of demographic variables across each community within the City of Hamilton.
Funded by: United Way of Burlington & Greater HamiltonCreating Positive Space for the LGBTQ Community is an executive summary of the longer report, Report on the Needs Assessment of the LGBTQ Community of Hamilton. This summary highlights the fear that LGBTQ people have in terms of “coming out” at places of work, school, and faith communities for example.
Funded by: Ontario Trillium Foundation
Community Partner: Hamilton Pride Festival Inc. (HPFI)
A small neighborhood in East Hamilton bound by Centennial Parkway, Barton, Queenston Road, and Lake Avenue Park, right next to the border between Stoney Creek and the original Hamilton, Riverdale West is home to a vibrant mix of citizens from around the world.
Community Partner: Community Action Program for ChildrenThis needs assessment came about because of the vision of the Board of Directors for Hamilton Pride Festival Inc. (Hamilton Pride). After conducting a short survey at Hamilton Pride 2005, the board saw a need to expand the scope of their survey and look more broadly at issues for the LGBTQ community in Hamilton. Hamilton Pride Festival Inc. partnered with the SPRC to conduct the data collection, analysis and report writing. Through surveys, focus groups and key informant interviews, this community based research has helped to articulate some of the many needs of the LGBTQ community in Hamilton with recommendations as to how these could be addressed effectively.
Funded by: Ontario Trillium Foundation
Community Partner: Hamilton Pride Festival Inc. (HPFI)
The purpose of this research was to develop a better understanding of local child care needs from the perspectives of key stakeholders, and to identify innovative strategies that complement the existing child care system and meet current needs.
Funded by: Ontario Trillium Foundation Community Partner: Today’s Family Early Learning and Child Care, Saint Mark’s Cooperative PreschoolIn 2006, the Hamilton-Wentworth District School Board (HWDSB) initiated an evaluation process aimed at gathering data on the diversity of the staff in the organization. The administration recognized that it lacked the statistical data necessary on staff diversity to fully inform human resource practices connected to staff recruitment, retention and development initiatives. Working with community leaders to develop a comprehensive equity policy, the board saw conducting a Diversity Audit as another step in becoming a diversity-competent organization.
Commissioned by: Hamilton-Wentworth District School BoardMeasuring Homelessness in Hamilton (2007) is to identify the central factors that impact homelessness and to provide a basis for the community, the City and senior levels of governments to discuss and address homelessness. This report builds on the information in On Any Given Night (2006) by presenting new data on factors contributing to homelessness, a demographic profile of people experiencing homelessness and key service utilization statistics.
Community Partner: City of Hamilton – Housing and Homelessness DivisionThe SPRC was commissioned by the St. Joseph’s Immigrant Women’s Centre to detail a plan for evaluation of the Facilitating Inclusion Leadership Enhancement project and then charged with the task of implementing the plan.
Funded by: Hamilton Community Foundation Community Partner: St. Joseph’s Immigrant Women’s CentreThe SPRC committed to implementing the Immigrant Skills Workforce Integration Project (ISWIP) with funding from the Hamilton Community Foundation. The purpose of the project was to develop a community plan for Hamilton that would fully integrate immigrant professionals and trades people into the local labour force at their optimal skill level. There are eight sections in this report that provide a complete record of the project and development of the community plan for Hamilton.
Funded by: Hamilton Community Foundation (Tackling Poverty Together Fund) Community Partner: Immigrant Skills Workforce Integration Project Advisory Committee (ISWIP)Women in Hamilton have a poverty rate of 22% compared with men’s rate of 18%. A deeper look reveals further inequities between men and women in select categories. There are also significant differences in poverty rates between women of different backgrounds.
Funded by: United Way of Burlington & Greater HamiltonThe City of Hamilton increase in diversity necessitates a review of the operation and design of the sectors which seek to serve the public to ensure that all needs are being met. In response to this message, in September 2005, a working group and steering committee, led by Sport Hamilton, sought to better understand the issues of access to recreation for children and youth from cultural and ethno-racial groups in our community. The SPRC was commissioned to consult the community to further localize and understand the barriers faced by diverse ethno-racial children and youth.
Funded by: Heritage CanadaPhase One of the Barton Street Community Partners for Crime Prevention took place in 2000. It included extensive consultation with primary stakeholders including youth, women, sex trade workers, residents and business people. The project included an extensive needs assessment into the issue of women and the sex trade. It concluded that work must be done from a harm reduction perspective and that there was a real need to create a common understanding of the issues of sex trade work before any systemic change could take place. These concepts were incorporated into the Phase Two project.
Funded by: National Crime Prevention Strategy, Community Mobilization Program Community Partner: St. Matthew’s House, Barton Street Advisory Committee
