2022 was a huge year for WTC - the organization has continued to steadily grow, building upon the decade of impact led by so many amazing volunteers.
This blog post offers a non-exhaustive list of what we've accomplished together over this past year — but you can also see our full 2022 Annual Report below.
Watch Council Advocacy
Collaborated with 14 organizations on a letter to council about a motion to increase CCTV and facial recognition in Vancouver, while speaking out at Council as well. The motion was denied.
Supported the 8th & Arbutus supportive housing initiative which passed in Council to provide over 100 new homes in the Kitsilano area
Supported The Vancouver Urban Food Forest’s application to create a community garden at Burrard View Park at the Parks Board meeting, which passed
Wrote 4 public statements in coalition with over 10 organizations
Signed public letters written by Pivot Legal to Stop the Sweeps, Dignity Network in support of LGTBQI folks, in collaboration with sexual and reproductive health advocates
Published a statement calling for a full investigation into the death of Chelsea Poorman.
Hosted several guest speakers to speak to critical issues in Vancouver
Hot Pink Paper Campaign
Engaged over 600 women and gender-marginalized people across Vancouver to understand what issues in this election cycle were critical to them
Collaborated with almost 30 community organizations, half of whom endorsed our policy asks
Reached over 120,000 people who viewed our candidate commitment card & 1,000 people who downloaded our policy brief pdf
Motivated 54 candidates from the 10 major parties to complete our survey
Convinced 65% of candidates to publicly agree to implement all eight of our policy asks if elected
Had our policy asks included in 8 out of 10 of the major municipal party platforms, including verbatim language by ABC
Influenced Spinal Cord Injury BC to run their own version of the HPPC provincially on accessibility issues and Inclusion BC to run their own version as well
Cities Organize!
Launched Organize! An intersectional toolkit for municipal campaigning
We trained a cohort of 15 individuals, arming them with the skills needed to start their own community campaign.
“90% of participants indicated that they “agree” or “strongly agree” that after Cities Organize they would feel comfortable and well equipped to start organizing around issues in their local community, compared to 11.2% before the cohort.”
“82% of participants indicated that they would be comfortable speaking to council on an issues they are passionate about or organizing around, compared to 39% before the cohort.”
City Action
Delivered workshops to Minerva, the YWCA, SFU Women’s Centre, and South Vancouver Neighbourhood Center on
Intersectionality
Community Organizing & Campaigning
Civic Participation for Women
Partnered with the City of Vancouver to deliver 6 workshops that focus on increasing civic literacy and engagement
Received funding from WAGE to deliver 12 more workshops for free to local organizations on community organizing and civic engagement
Truth and Reconciliation in Local Government
Over 70 local government representatives (46% of incorporated municipalities) across BC completed survey responses providing their limitations in completing the Calls to Action that relate to local government
Met with BC Parliamentary Secretary for Anti-Racism and BC Parliamentary Secretary for Non-Profits, Niki Sharma, to share initial research findings
Delivered a workshop to elected officials and local government staff at the Union of British Columbian municipalities “Advancing the TRC Calls to Action”
Met with two officials from the BC Ministry for Municipal Engagement to discuss ways that the ministry can support local governments in the Calls to Action implementation
Met with Indigenous leaders from Indigenous Watchdog, Reconciliation Canada, BC Association of Aboriginal Friendship Centres, Native Womens' Association of Canada and more
Women Friendly Cities Challenge
Worked with 4 interns from the UBC Arts Amplifier program over the summer who
Developed a full website audit that focused on increasing accessibility, updating out-of-date Wise Practices, and increasing the geographic spread of new practices
Improved the design and searchability of the site
Created a Wise Practice Research Database
Added over 25 new Wise Practices to our living library
Panels & Events
Hosted our 10-year anniversary celebration with a film screening of documentary Running With My Girls
Organized Centering Equity - a candidates forum featuring 17 City Council candidates discussing questions directly tied to our 8 HPPC policy asks
WTC board members Joy Masuhara and Serena Jackson along with matriarch Ellen Woodsworth spoke at the Pride Human Rights Convention in Winnipeg
Matriarch, Ellen Woodsworth, presented at several international forums
Our co-chairs presented at the City of Vancouver Candidate Information Session as well as Elect Her! the Northern BC Chapter
We spoke at the WAGE all staff forum about the impact of the Capacity Building and Feminist Response and Recovery grant
WTC participated on a panel for the Health Sciences Association of BC on housing policy solutions
Presented to a youth cohort taking part in a Fraser Basin Council program about intersectionality and climate justice
Comms & Engagement
Developed a long term media and communications strategy
Hosted media training for our staff team and select volunteers
Wrote over 20 blog posts related to City Council motions, accessibility, equity mandates, and more
Featured in the following media outlets:
Global News
Vancouver is Awesome
CBC’s On the Coast with Gloria Mackarenko
Georgia Straight
RedEye Radio
CJSF
Cambie Report
Had 250 new newsletter subscribers in 2022
Overall this year people who visited our site did so more often and had more interactions with the content.
Increased followers and engagement across Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and Instagram
People & Community
Developed an updated mission and vision for WTC that strongly reflects our principles
Hired a total of six short-term interns that greatly contributed to our projects
Added another staff member, Victoria (Action Researcher), to our team
Onboarded 20 new volunteers to the WTC community
35 new members joined us to strengthen our movement
Capacity Building & Financial Health
Received a grant from the Canadian Race Relations Foundation to expand the TRC and 2SMMIWG action in municipalities work
Received a grant from BC Heritage Fund for TRC work
Received a Small Business BC Workplace Accessibility Grant
Received a matching fund grant from Think Causality to refresh our logo
Successful in Federation of Canadian Municipalities Grant in partnership with COV to deliver 4-6 civic literacy and engagement workshops with the City across
Received an Impact internship grant to hire an intern
Lots of internal capacity building work: technology and device policy, health benefit policy, cybersecurity policy, set up a Customer Relationship Management system
Received Charitable Status
2023 Priorities
Local advocacy & action
Hold elected officials to account on their commitments
Ensure that the experiences of women and gender-marginalized people are valued & represented in city initiatives
Build & maintain relationships with City Council to be a resource to them to put an intersectional lens on all their work
Strengthening our coalition building with local community groups advocating for values-aligned issues
Building civic literacy & skills
Delivering workshops with community partners across the Lower Mainland to build the civic participation of groups who are underrepresented in local processes
Producing free downloadable materials and video content
Workshops in partnership with the City of Vancouver in communities with low voter turnout
Truth & reconciliation
Publishing our findings and recommendations from the Local Government’s Actions and Barriers implementing the TRC Calls to Action
Delivering workshops for municipalities across the province
Supporting Watch Council in other municipalities