October 26, 2020, Regent Park SDP Stakeholders Table “Deep Delve” Meeting Report

By Adonis Huggins - Adonis is a staff member of the FOCUS Media Arts Centre

At 5 pm on October 26, 2020, the SDP Stakeholders Table met over the on-line platform of Zoom to discuss and make decisions related to the City of Toronto’s Social Development Plan funding allocation for Regent Park.

According to the chair, Diana Mavunduse, tonight’s SDP Stakeholders Table meeting was entirely devoted to finalizing $625,000 of project activities for submission to the City of Toronto.  
 
Following the Land Acknowledgement Diana facilitated a check to see if the require number of residents were present the quorum was met. Quorum was confirmed.

After a Guiding Principles document was read, Ismail Afrah provided a background related to the City funding of the SDP.  The SDP consists of a series of action plans focused around four priority areas (Community Building, Employment, Safety and Communications) each led by a committee.

Ismail indicated that between the four committees, the current budget request for year 1 SDP proposed activities amounted approximately to $661,500.00.  Considering the City allocation to the Regent Park SDP was only $625,000, the main goal of the meeting was to find a consensus way to cut approximately $36,500.00 from the submitted projects.

Following a short presentation from each of the committees, Diana passed the chair over to another member of the coordinating team, Michael Rosenberg.
Michael began by reminding the group that their task was to cut approximately $36,500 out of the budget of submitted projects.

Michael indicated that the group could do it through consensus, by committee members voluntarily proposing cuts to their own project budgets, or the group could make proposals for cuts that everyone could support.
 
In the event that the group could not reach consensus, Michael would initiate a voting process.  The project that receives the less votes, would be reduced by $36,500 or eliminated completely from the submitted projects.  

At this stage Michael open the floor for comments and suggestions on areas to be cut, cautioning that members should try offering cuts from projects that were not from their own committees. Many suggestions as to what to cut were offered.
A number of suggestions that was offered for cuts were around staffing costs.  

Despite all the proposals in favor of cutting staff budgets there was equally strong opposition from others who felt the importance of providing a family living wage and feeling that the scope of the work justified the wages and positions.
Another popular area for reductions was cuts to the Trustee budget – which also varied widely across all the project areas, from none to 15%. Suggestions were made to have agencies provide this service as in-kind support.

This suggestion was opposed due to the fact that negotiation would need to be had with the trustee agency before such cuts could be considered.

The hour-long discussion resulted in the Communications group volunteering to cut the language translation project for $8,250, and the Employment and Economic Opportunities offering cuts to his Food Rounds project budget in the amount of $3,500.

Approximately $25,000 in more cuts would be required.  However, before Michael could proceed with the voting process for an elimination of a project, much opposition was encountered from members who desired the opportunity to discuss their budgets within their respective committees.   It was decided that each committee would retire to Zoom breakout rooms to discuss their budgets and return with $5,000 to $10,000 in items to cut.

The first committee to report back from the breakout session was the Safety Committee. The committee announced that they would not be making cuts to their budget because they did not anticipate trustee costs and that they would have to identify how to pay for these costs from their existing budget. Some disappointment was expressed among the group but the Safety Committee held firm to their position that they would not be offering cuts to their budget.

The Employment and Economic Committee reported back next announcing that they could make additional cuts from their security project budget amounting to $3500.

The Communication Committee announced they would not make cuts reminded the group that they already eliminated the Translation project in the amount of $8,250.00 and their budget was already barebones and significantly less than all the other committees.

The Community Building Committee offered to cut staffing by $12,000, as the committee felt that some of their activities were unlikely to proceed as planned due to Covid pandemic.

Michael thank everyone and felt the table had done well, however with approximately $9,000 in more cuts to go Michael began the facilitation of a vote and opened the floor to suggestions as to how these votes could take place.

One proposal was to cut all the committees remaining budgets evenly. Some individuals voiced their disagreement to this proposal because their committee (especially the Community Building Committee) had already volunteer $12,000 in cuts, pointing out that one of the committees (Safety) made no cuts to their budget at all.  Members of the Safety committee took offense, arguing that they still not only had to account for the Trustee costs but that they made cuts to their projects even before the deep dive process began, as part of their submission to the SDP.

With the meeting in danger of deteriorating to infighting between the committees, the chairs interceded reminding everyone that we are one community.

The third proposal and the one likely to find consensus was to have everyone vote for a project that they think should have the budget reduced by $9,000.

Before this vote could take place, the Community Building Committee offered to reduce its trustee budget by $2,600.00 and just as the vote was to take place, the Employment and Economic Committee felt they could identify project funding elsewhere and saved the day by offering to reduce the Food Round project, effectively ending the need for addition cuts.
 
The chairs, thanking everyone for their cooperation, announced that the Deep Dive Meeting of the SDP Stakeholders Table achieved its goal of approving a first year set of activities and a budget that meets the City allocation of $625,000.00 and thanked everyone for their participation.

The 3 and half hour meeting of the SDP Stakeholders Table ended at 8:30 pm.