Welcome to the Call to Action Table of Contents

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Welcome to the Call to Action

Introduction to the Call to Action

OurWinnipeg Includes Aboriginal People

A Sustainable Winnipeg

Creating the Call to Action

Sustainability
What We've Heard
Key Path
Actions

Communities
What We've Heard
Key Path
Actions

Safety & Security
What We've Heard
Key Path
Actions

City Competitiveness
What We've Heard
Key Path
Actions

City of the Arts
What We've Heard
Key Path
Actions

City Building
What We've Heard
Key Path
Actions

Speak Up Winnipeg, by the numbers

Call to Action Contributors

Welcome to the Call to Action for OurWinnipeg. As the first report in the creation of OurWinnipeg, the Call to Action reflects the thoughtful input of an entire city – gathered through SpeakUpWinnipeg – the largest outreach campaign and the biggest conversation about the city’s future that Winnipeg has ever seen. It also draws on an immense research and analysis undertaking by the City of Winnipeg; on support from the Province of Manitoba; and the involvement and contributions of more than 50 community partners.

Collectively, we have said that OurWinnipeg is about living and caring because we plan on staying. This is a powerful vision that speaks to Winnipeg’s strong sense of community, of compassion, and of our commitment to creating a sustainable city that not only offers us opportunity today, but also ensures opportunity for future generations.

I have been immensely impressed by the quality and quantity of participation in SpeakUpWinnipeg over the last 6 months, but it is important that we continue to grow the number of people involved with creating our new citywide plan. If you haven’t taken part in SpeakUpWinnipeg yet, I invite you to join in the conversation now. Take a look at the Call to Action – at what we’ve heard so far and the early actions the City plans to take – and add your voice to the dialogue. The more points of view that are included in the conversation, the stronger our city and our plan will be.

The Call to Action is a critical interim step in the development of OurWinnipeg. It connects our honest and open conversation with action on community priorities. Whether it is leading by example with a new City sustainable procurement policy, taking a strong partnership and advocacy role in eliminating poverty or any one of the more than 70 other actions, these are exciting directions that show what OurWinnipeg can do and that move us together towards our vision.

Sincerely,

Mayor Sam Katz

Introduction to the Call to Action:

It’s Our City. It’s Our Plan. It’s Our Time

Hello everyone. It’s a pleasure to introduce the Call to Action for OurWinnipeg – a report on the first half of the SpeakUpWinnipeg process and the halfway point in creating a new citywide plan for Winnipeg.

When the project of creating a new plan was launched in April 2009, Mayor Katz said he wanted to involve the entire community in the process. After six months, I’m pleased to say that Winnipeggers have been generous in sharing their opinions and expertise. With the involvement of more than 30,000 people through SpeakUpWinnipeg.com, at roundtable meetings and at festivals and events through the SpeakUpSquad, we have received a great deal of valuable input and can count many groups and organizations as partners in the project of planning Winnipeg’s future.

I’ve had the opportunity to be involved in SpeakUpWinnipeg on the website and at roundtables, and it’s been made abundantly clear to me that Winnipeggers care deeply about their city; they are very concerned about the kind of place they now live in and also in the kind of a place they will leave to future generations. Some participants have talked about protecting our assets– our neighbourhoods, our trees and our diverse economy, for example. Others talked about addressing our challenges – our aging infrastructure, poverty and accessibility. Almost all these perspectives showed a desire for a plan that focuses on enhancing our city’s economic, social and environmental sustainability and for a plan that provides clear measures of progress– measurements that can be used to guide decisions and to demonstrate accountability.

I’m confident that through your involvement in SpeakUpWinnipeg, the City of Winnipeg will deliver a plan next spring that will meet these expectations and will reflect a shared community vision– a plan that can legitimately be called OurWinnipeg.

The Call to Action for OurWinnipeg comes about halfway through the process of creating the new plan and is an opportunity for the City of Winnipeg to check back with the community to make sure we heard you right (and to make corrections if we didn’t). It’s also a chance for us to take some early steps on ideas and directions suggested by the community. Although we are only part way through the process of creating OurWinnipeg, there are things we can do right now to start working towards our vision: OurWinnipeg: living and caring because we plan on staying.

These actions, some of them quite small and some which are pretty monumental, are just the beginning. They don’t represent complete strategy or policy (that’s coming with your help, through the second half of SpeakUpWinnipeg). But they are important in demonstrating that the City is listening, and that your civic government is serious about planning for sustainability and looking at new ways of doing things. The conversation we’ve been having is important, and my hope is that it will continue. But we also need to start taking action as quickly as we can.

In the spirit of working together to create a vibrant, inclusive and sustainable Winnipeg, I invite you to review and share your comments on this draft for the OurWinnipeg Call to Action document.

Sincerely,

Glen Laubenstein, Chief Administrative Officer

OurWinnipeg Includes Aboriginal People

The City of Winnipeg recognizes the importance of the original peoples– the First Nations, Metis and Inuit– to the founding of our city. Each contributed culture, values and vision– contributions that will continue to be important to our shared future.

The Red and Assiniboine rivers are well travelled, with their use as major transport routes dating as far back as 4000 BCE. For millennia, Ojibwa, Cree, Assiniboine and Dakota nations lived alongside and travelled through these waterways. It is from where these two rivers meet that Winnipeg (Cree for ‘muddy waters') emerged to become a vibrant fishing, trading and farming economy. The arrival of newcomers to this territory over a century ago saw the original peoples share these lands, rivers, and resources. It's a relationship that continues to this day.

In OurWinnipeg, The City of Winnipeg will honour this relationship by recognizing the significant contributions of Aboriginal people while working to meet the common vision and needs articulated by all citizens, Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal alike. These include calls to action in areas like community consultation, safety, housing and transportation.

Today, the vibrant, diverse people who make up the larger Aboriginal community enrich and enliven the social fabric of Winnipeg: they remain vital to its economic and cultural future.