The evaluation captures our community's progress towards achieving the systems change priorities in the Enough for All Strategy. The evaluation also provides direction to Vibrant Communities Calgary on its role in successfully advancing the Enough for All Strategy.
Project
More Important Than Ever: Enough For All Evaluation Report
Every year Enough for All is evaluated by an independent third-party. The evaluation captures our community's progress towards achieving systems change priorities. The evaluation also provides direction to Vibrant Communities Calgary on its role in successfully advancing the Enough for All Strategy.
8 September 2022
What does the evaluation tell us?
How is the strategy evaluated?
The Enough for All 2021 evaluation was conducted by Dr. Katrina Milaney, Associate Professor in Community Rehabilitation & Disability Studies and Associate Scientific Director of Population Health for the O'Brien Institute for Public Health at the University of Calgary. Stakeholders participated in surveys, focus groups and interviews. A review of Champion research and annual reports were also undertaken. Indicators like employment rates, income support caseloads, program statistics were analyzed. In all, information from 43 people or organizations and 70 documents were reviewed.
A community-owned strategy
Enough for All is a community-owned strategy. In short, the strategy creates the ecosystem for poverty reduction initiatives to be locally relevant and grounded in best practices for poverty reduction. It also provides focus for collective action through a principles-focused lens grounded in social justice, equity, and Reconciliation.
Because of Enough for All there is collective commitment, strategic efforts and accountability measures to reduce poverty. Here are some of the community successes towards achieving Enough for All that were realized in 2021.
Community highlights
$41M
in tax refunds was acquired by people using free tax clinics
96%
of people accessing Calgary’s Fair Entry program said it made their lives better
34,000
youth participated in City employment programs
500+
RESPs were opened through Aspire partner agencies
107,000+
people participated in programs to build social inclusion
34,710
people accessed Community Hubs
40,760
people purchased at least one low income transit pass, 92% said it saved them money
53
certified employers across Alberta have committed to paying workers a living wage
Vibrant Communities Calgary as the Steward of Enough for All
Vibrant Communities Calgary has been the steward (backbone) of the Enough for All Strategy since 2015. A strong backbone organization is essential to creating focus and leadership to systems change work. Enough for All Champions and stakeholders believed the achievements identified below would not exist with VCC specifically in this stewardship role.
Recommendations
The evaluation identified 10 recommendations for future priorities.
- Build VCC’s capacity as backbone to increase engagement and coordination with Champions.
- Work with Champions and stakeholders to examine existing data that aligns with Enough for All Levers and goals.
- Expand the capacity of the Indigenous Advisory Committee and VCC’s Indigenous Engagement Facilitator to leverage the growth in anti-racism and policy and system change work.
- Continue to partner with local and provincial groups to create a ‘provincial voice’ for poverty reduction.
- Expand awareness and reach by creating a ‘space’ for Champions to share their collective efforts.
- Seek additional funding to expand the VCC team to address capacity issues and to offer staffing resources and small project grant funding to Champions.
- Build government relations strategies and continue to prioritize policy and system change work.
- Launch a collective media campaign on poverty with a goal to build awareness about dignity.
- Continue to monitor the long-term effects of changes to funding, policy and COVID-19 on the sector and Calgarians, including school engagement.
- Conduct a cumulative evaluation of Enough for All and VCC that shows changes over time, progress towards previous recommendations and provide a strategic direction for poverty reduction beyond 2022.
Background and Context
The Enough for All Strategy was adopted unanimously by City Council and the United Way of Calgary and Area’s Board of Directors in 2013. In 2015, Vibrant Communities Calgary was appointed the steward of the strategy to act as a backbone organization to guide its implementation, but with the larger community as its collective ‘owner’. The Strategy’s vision is for Calgary to be ‘a community where there is enough for all’. The mission is to create opportunities to align and leverage the work of hundreds of organizations and thousands of Calgarians to reduce poverty. There are 10 Levers of Change that are documented ‘game-changers’ for poverty reduction that contribute to progress in three goals:
Communities are essential to poverty reduction because they enable people to work together to address social and economic challenges. Communities also give people the network of support they need in times of stress, crisis or change. Increasing social inclusion and giving people a place to get together, make friends and be part of their community go a long way toward solving some of the basic problems that keep people in poverty.
Financial vulnerability affects many people in Calgary. Over the past several decades, wages have not kept up with the rapidly increasing cost of living. Most of those living below the poverty line belong to households in which at least one person is working. Many more are living above the poverty line, yet experience financial vulnerability due to low levels of saving and high levels of debt. To effectively address poverty, we must provide people with opportunities to earn sufficient incomes and build financial assets. This requires both financial empowerment and increased economic participation, as well as adequate income supports for those unable to find work, work full-time or work at all.
The urgency of poverty among Indigenous people in Calgary cannot be overstated. As stated in Article 1 of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, “Indigenous peoples have suffered from historic injustices as a result of their colonization and dispossession of their lands, territories and resources, preventing them from exercising, in particular, their right to development in accordance with their own needs and interests.” In addition to the cultural, socio-economic, systemic and psychosocial consequences poverty has on a population, it stymies the long-term potential and progress of individuals and the larger community.
Key Partners
The City of Calgary, United Way of Calgary and Area and Momentum are formal partners with Vibrant Communities Calgary in the implementation of the strategy. The evaluation was guided by the Impact and Evaluation Advisory Committee which is made up of representatives from each of these organizations.
More important than ever
Read how Vibrant Communities Calgary is doing on its path to a Calgary where there is Enough for All.