33 search results for
Living in rural communities
Recommendation 31:
We call upon all governments to immediately commence the construction of new housing and the provision of repairs for existing housing to meet the housing needs of Indigenous women, girls, and 2SLGBTQQIA people. This construction and provision of repairs must ensure that Indigenous women, girls, and 2SLGBTQQIA people have access to housing that is safe, appropriate to geographic and cultural needs, and available wherever they reside, whether in urban, rural, remote, or Indigenous communities.
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Recommendation 38:
We call upon all governments to fund the provision of policing services within Indigenous communities in northern and remote areas in a manner that ensures that those services meet the safety and justice needs of the communities and that the quality of policing services is equitable to that provided to non-Indigenous Canadians. This must include but is not limited to the following measures:
- With the growing reliance on information management systems, particularly in the area of major and interjurisdictional criminal investigations, remote communities must be ensured access to reliable high-speed Internet as a right;
- Major crime units and major case management must be more accessible to remote and northern communities on a faster basis than the service is being delivered now;
- Capacity must be developed in investigative tools and techniques for the investigation of sexualized violence, including but not limited to tools for the collection of physical evidence, such as sexual assault kits, and specialized and trauma-informed questioning techniques; and
- Crime-prevention funding and programming must reflect community needs.
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Recommendation 72:
We call upon all governments to fund an increase in recruitment of Indigenous Peoples to all police services, and for all police services to include representation of Indigenous women, girls, and 2SLGBTQQIA people, inclusive of diverse Indigenous cultural backgrounds, within their ranks. This includes measures such as the following:
- Achieve representative First Nations, Inuit, and Métis diversity and gender diversity within all police services through intensive and specialized recruitment across Canada.
- Ensure mandatory Indigenous language capacity within police services.
- Ensure that screening of recruits includes testing for racial, gender, gender identity, and sexual orientation bias.
- Include the Indigenous community in the recruitment and hiring committees/process.
- In training recruits, include: history of police in the oppression and genocide of Indigenous Peoples; anti-racism and anti-bias training; and culture and language training. All training must be distinctions-based and relevant to the land and people being served; training must not be pan-Indigenous.
- Retain Indigenous officers through relevant employment supports, and offer incentives to Indigenous officers to meet their unique needs as Indigenous officers serving Indigenous communities, to ensure retention and overall health and wellness of the service.
- End the practice of limited-duration posts in all police services, and instead implement a policy regarding remote and rural communities focused on building and sustaining a relationship with the local community and cultures. This relationship must be led by, and in partnership with, the Indigenous Peoples living in those remote and rural communities.
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Recommendation 33:
We call upon all governments to ensure that adequate plans and funding are put into place for safe and affordable transit and transportation services and infrastructure for Indigenous women, girls, and 2SLGBTQQIA people living in remote or rural communities. Transportation should be sufficient and readily available to Indigenous communities, and in towns and cities located in all of the provinces and territories in Canada. These plans and funding should take into consideration:
- ways to increase safe public transit;
- ways to address the lack of commercial transit available;
- and special accommodations for fly-in, northern, and remote communities.
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Recommendation 206:
We call upon all governments and service providers to support networking and community building for 2SLGBTQQIA people who may be living in different urban centres (and rural and remote areas), and to increase opportunities for 2SLGBTQQIA networking, collaboration, and peer support through a national organization, regional organizations, advocacy body, and/or a task force dedicated to advancing action to support the well-being of Indigenous 2SLGBTQQIA persons in Canada.
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Recommendation 6:
The price of food in some communities that are more remote is more expensive than in many communities that are located closer to bigger centres where choice and price competition exists. It is recommended that the Provincial Government consider implementing a food subsidy program for low-income families in more remote communities.
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Recommendation 40:
The federal government must guarantee:
- Access to clean drinking water; food security based on a traditional diet; critical infrastructure including roads and sanitation systems; and essential health, education, child care, housing, transport, recreational, cultural, and emergency services on every reserve.
- Safe, affordable, and livable housing for every woman on her reserve that is independent of her matrimonial status.
- Affordable child care and licensed day care options on every reserve.
- Complete complement of maternal and infant/child health services on reserve to enable women to remain closer to home to give birth.
- Free public transportation between each town and city located along the entire length of Highway 16 and all other highways, with a number of safe homes and emergency phone booths along the length of all the highways.
- Increase funding on all reserves for programs and services that strengthen traditional and cultural knowledge grounded in Indigenous laws, values, and practices.
- Range of anti-violence services including preventive programs, crisis intervention, victim services, advocacy support, restorative justice circles, shelters, transitional housing, and second-stage housing on every reserve.
- Cultural sensitivity training for all first responders such as police, healthcare professionals, and social workers who assist survivors of violence on reserve.
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Recommendation 7:
Support meaningful connectivity for anti-violence workers of all abilities and make online training more accessible by providing closed captions on online webinars.
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Recommendation 6:
Revise policies relating to connectivity and expansion goals in order to recognize gender-based and intersectional elements of digital divides, as well as how these relate to violence and anti-violence work. Shift work related to connectivity from a conversation that focuses mainly on economic inclusion and opportunities to one where gender equality and safety is also central.
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Recommendation 7:
Restructure provincial and national arts funding in Canada. Funding initiatives for Indigenous peoples are still immensely important. But they need to be managed by Indigenous peoples and redesigned in a way that decentralizes institutional modes of power.
- Indigenous juries should have demographic qualifications, based on Indigenous consultation and development, that will ensure that all juries consist of diverse generations, backgrounds, fields, geographies, and other considerations.
- Granting bodies should shift to Indigenous board, panel, peer-reviewed, or jury led adjudication of professional status. Adjudication that accounts for alternative forms of professional development such as community knowledge and histories of mentorship. Until this is implemented, there should be greater transparency and dialog regarding the process of professional accreditation; namely, the assigning officers, their races and relationships to Indigenous peoples, and their qualifications to make such adjudications on behalf of Indigenous creative communities.
- The management of granting organizations and grant officers should meet demographic quotas that shift the minority and majority interest in Canada’s arts and culture granting institutions. Recruitment campaigns must widen their understanding of who can, and should, occupy these positions, even if that means investing in mentorship.
- Granting programs should strive to be discipline specific and include demographic quotas for diverse Indigenous groups such as Inuit, Black-Indigenous peoples, peoples residing in Reserve communities, folks in regions outside of currently over-represented central Ontario and Vancouver such as the prairies and the East Coast, community artists and vendors, first-time applicants, and other considerations.
- Granting bodies must invest significant resources into strengthening Indigenous self-identification measures, at least when it comes to accessing Indigenous funding lines. This will be a challenging exercise and must be flexible and evolving and ensure an ongoing dialog. Thus, this process requires continued resource investment from cultural institutions.
- Policy should be developed, in consultation with Indigenous communities, around the threshold of number of Indigenous employees to qualify for and receive Indigenous funding, and what precisely constitutes “Indigenous Art” for funding purposes.
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