fitting that I’m standing in the middle
of a circle and you’re gonna learn more
about that as I talk about the
compassionate City project I want you to
imagine a city that’s not defined by its
roads its buildings its parks but I want
you to you imagine imagine a city that
is defined by its inclusivity its
diversity
so the concept I’m going to be talking
about today has the power to change
community and redefine a city so I
became mayor and when I became mayor I
started to learn more about the issues
that face communities not just in st.
Catharines brought across the country
we’re a midsize city issues like poverty
mental illness addiction those things
that happen in our community that we
don’t really talk about often enough and
when you look at how we change
communities I had an opportunity to go
to a couple of poverty summits and I was
I was listening to those at the poverty
summits talk about what we’re doing and
how we’re trying to help those in our
community we could talk about transit we
could talk about affordable housing we
could talk about the kind of help that
helps people get back on their feet but
I kept writing down this one line and it
starts from within it’s this concept of
starting from within and so when I came
back I kept coming back to this simple
line and what does starts from within
mean so looking at community I started
to see community as a circle and so when
you look at the city of st. Catharines
and you look at it from the perspective
of a circle much like I’m in today ask
yourselves I want you to
was your eyes and picture a circle and
who do you see in that circle your mum
and dad your parents your brothers and
sisters your friends your neighbors now
I want to ask you about those who do you
see the homeless person in that circle
do you see the young mother who has an
autistic child who hasn’t been able to
go for dinner in a month do you see the
older widowed woman who no longer has a
family Network do you see the sex trade
worker do you see the drug addict
because they don’t see themselves in
that circle and I’m sure a lot of us
folks don’t see themselves in that
circle as well so that brings us to the
concept of compassionate City because as
part of a compassionate City we are all
inside the circle we stand inside the
circle there’s no one who’s invisible
there’s no one who’s marginalized and
how do we use our sight how do we use a
lens to ensure that we’re inside that
circle so it starts with the lens of
compassion we get up every day and we
put a lens on on how we look at the
world we got a lens of indifference we
have a lens of apathy frustration anger
there’s these lenses that we put on
whether you wear glasses or not we put
them on every day the compassionate City
project is saying you can put on a
compassionate lens every day and why did
we choose compassion what is it about
that word compassion is care plus action
we all care for one another I see that
every day as mayor we all care for one
another but it’s the action part that
has the opportunity to change how we
think it has the opportunity to get to
the root causes of poverty so the
compassionate city project is about
changing how we see one another
it’s about how we interact with one
another
and I believe that that is the way that
you can get to the root causes of
addiction of mental health of poverty
the cycle of poverty that is affecting
more and more people in our community
that is marginalizing more and more
people that surround us through the
compassionate lens you can make a
difference because while I believe it’s
important that we can give to an
organization or that we can donate to an
organization or we can retweet about a
cause that we believe in there’s more
that needs to be done and that starts
with how you approach how you think
about those beside you how you think
about your neighbors your friends down
the road but also those that are been
largely marginalized to the point of
being invisible
so I’ll just share a quick story as
mayor I’ve been talking about the
compassionate City project for the
better part of last year I had an
opportunity to go away last year we went
to nova scotia with my family and during
that time there was a sweep in a part of
our city the police went in and arrested
a whole bunch of folks they’re called
prostitutes they’re really sex trade
workers and the paper had it on the
front cover they were handcuffed and all
across my social media feeds I started
getting these tweets and messages
Facebook messages in Halifax I’m
thinking what’s going on in in my city
get in contact with my staff and they’re
saying mr. mayor the community is
talking about how the police went in and
arrested these women you got to do
something about it I said let us sit for
so I had an opportunity to come back a
few days later and what it showed to me
as I read through the feeds it was mr.
mayor how is this a compassionate City
when you’re arresting these men with
these women mr. mayor how was you
showing compassion when these women who
are down on their luck are being put in
jail mr. mayor how was this a
compassionate City and the unique aspect
of it is if this incident would have
happened two years ago it would have
been on the front page and then
forgotten about the women would have
been invisible but now because of the
compassionate City project the community
was saying how is that compassion we
need to work with these women we need to
work with the women to ensure that
they’re brought back into our community
that they are given the supports not put
in jail given the supports to try and
get their life back on track that showed
that using a lens of compassion works
because we were able to change and work
with the Niagara Regional Police and
social agencies to give the women the
opportunity to get back on their feet
to break the cycle of poverty that’s
what compassionate City means and that’s
what compassionate City is doing you
have the power to look at community in a
different way using compassion you can
be the change you can make the change so
my ask is this just imagine if st.
Catharines was known as the most
compassionate city in Canada or how
about North America or the world how
would you see and who would you see in
that circle thank you
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