Community-driven research to enhance opportunities for urban Aboriginals

Over half of Canada’s Aboriginal population lives and works in the country’s urban centres, a place where employment, education and healthcare support opportunities are often hardest to find.

Friendship centres in Grande Prairie and Red Deer are taking the first steps towards building a strategic action plan that will improve the opportunities available to their local communities.

“A lot of people are underemployed,” said Kelly Benning, executive director of the Grande Prairie Friendship Centre, speaking of the challenges facing the urban Aboriginal community. “A lot of people in their home communities are receiving substandard education. It’s outrageous, but most of our people have to upgrade. … There are huge barriers. Health—so many of our Aboriginal people are not well. … Transportation is a huge issue. Basically we have people coming to our urban centres, wandering lost and alone.”

GPFC first took action two winters ago, holding two dialogues. The first dialogue engaged the Aboriginal community in Grande Prairie to find out where the gaps were in programs, services and opportunities. The second dialogue focused on industry and retail, identifying their needs and employment requirements.

GPFC applied for Urban Aboriginal Strategy funding to continue to consolidate their research and received $100,000 to complete a preliminary action plan. Benning says this involved continued engagement with the urban Aboriginal community in Grande Prairie, as well as all service providers, industry and government agencies to identify needs and create solutions that will benefit the community as a whole.

“It’s like a compass, but a true compass. I can sit here and assume I know what the community wants, but this says exactly what our community wants and how to get there,” Benning said.

The Friendship Society in Red Deer is embarking on a similar information-gathering project for central Alberta with $48,300 in funding from UAS for its initial needs assessment.

“This funding begins the work of a strategic plan—we can’t create one in the six to eight week timeline, but we can engage the community and find our priorities,” said Tanya Schur, executive director of the Red Deer Native Friendship Society.

Both Benning and Schur agree that they are optimistic about the possible effects their work may have on the Urban Aboriginal Strategy because of the grass roots, community-driven nature of the research process.

 “This isn’t just a report, we’re seeing true participation and engagement from the community,” Schur said. “The community is driving the process, not the government, and the governments are supporting this community-driven leadership.”

Both the Grande Prairie and Red Deer friendship centres will provide a detailed report of their findings to Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada. Both hope to receive more funding in the future to continue to solidify action plans that will improve employment and access to education and healthcare opportunities for their communities.

 “I hope the government truly reads and listens to this report and acts accordingly,” Benning said.