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Home My WebLink About2023-12-14Clarington Clarington Diversity Advisory Committee Wednesday December 14, 2023 7:00 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. Virtual Via Microsoft Teams If this information is required in an alternate format, please contact the IDEA Officer at 905-623-3379 ext 2563 Present: Pranay Gunti Ron Hooper Tenzin Shomar Lauren Reyes -Grange Dione Valentine Joe Solway Aaliyah Ruddock Also Present: Pinder DaSilva — Clarington, IDEA Officer Regrets: Councillor Granville Anderson Andaleeb Shafi Yasmin Shafi Absent: Meera McDonald The meeting was called to order at 7:09pm. 1. Land Acknowledgement Statement Tenzin shared the Land Acknowledgement Statement. 2. Declarations of Interest No declarations of interest declared by members. 3. Review and Approval of Agenda + Introductions Motion that the agenda for the December 14, 2023 meeting be approved moved by Ron and seconded by Joe. Carried Introductions made of Pinder and the new committee members. 4. Review and approval of previous meeting minutes • September 13, 2023 • October 11, 2023 • October 17, 2023 • November 9, 2023 Page 11 Internal Motion to approve Sept, Oct and Nov 2023 minutes moved by Pranay and seconded by Aaliyah. Carried 5. Councillor Updates — Councillor Anderson Councillor Anderson was not able to attend so Tenzin provided the following update on behalf of Council: Clarington approved its first multi -year budget. Encouraged everyone, if they haven't already, to take a look at the budget. Parks, Rec and Culture Master Plan survey — online survey closes tomorrow. Tenzin encouraged everyone to provide their feedback on what type of capital expenditures activities related to parks, recreation and culture they would like to see the municipality focus on. 6. Vacant secretary position Current vacancy for this position on the committee. Decision made to not fill the position yet and Pinder will continue with capturing the minutes. 7. Community Updates Pinder provided the following updates: • Capstone Project with Ontario Tech approved with students starting in February and finishing the project by end of April. The project will include reviewing existing wellness and diversity initiatives/programs for employees. The student team will develop and present recommendations, based on information reviewed and stakeholder feedback, for wellness actions with a goal to improve employee "wellness" through the lens of diversity and anti -racism. Canada Day/Indigenous Day Celebrations — have applied for the Celebrate Canada Fund again this year. Pinder will provide an update once we know if we were eligible for the funds. Black History Month Celebrations — a working group has been formed with some Clarington staff members, Library & Museum, representative from Region of Durham and 4 members from the Anti -Black Racism committee. The goal of the working group is to plan a Black Vendor Market for February 24t" from 10-3 pm (times still need to be firmed up). First full committee meeting has been scheduled for January. Pinder will keep this committee updated on event as the planning progresses. Tenzin led the discussion on the following Motions with Pranay stepping into Chair Student Bursary Program • Tenzin indicated he would like to revisit the student bursary idea that was introduced in the spring to the committee, based off of the Town of Ajax's Shining Star bursary program. Wanting to implement it for the 2023-24 school year. Will need to create the criteria for the students and how the committee defines underrepresented youth. Need to determine if there will be one award for a student across the municipality or one award/high school? Page 12 Internal • Members discussed the need to create a working group that can work through all the logistics, including developing criteria and process; only be for high school students graduating and going to post -secondary; exploring mentoring and networking opportunity and partnering with different organizations/trades/businesses to do an apprenticeship. • Lauren mentioned that she helps facilitate a bursary and mentorship program for underrepresented black youth through her work so happy to help out with some of the initial conversations. • Need to explore funding options which Pinder will take back to municipality to discuss further. • Joe mentioned that the committee could look at getting corporate sponsorship, if the funds are difficult to obtain. The following Motion was moved by Tenzin Shomar, seconded by Dione: That the Diversity Advisory Committee endorse the creation of a bursary program for underrepresented students graduating from a Clarington high school for the 2023-2024 school year; and That a subcommittee be formed to establish the program guidelines, including but not limited to: • Eligibility • Number of bursaries offered • Bursary value • Application timeline • Assessment process • Marketing and promotion Motion put forward by Tenzin to appoint the following committee members to a working committee to bring back recommendation; Seconded by Joe. • Pranay Gunti • Lauren Reyes -Grange • Tenzin Shomar • Joe Solway Carried PA Day for non-Christian holiday • Tenzin shared that a number of school boards in Ontario considering shifting their PA days to ensure other non-Christian day are allocated to diverse celebrations (Diwali). • The committee agreed that this is a great step forward to increasing diversity in our schools. • Committee would need to recommend to council and then they would put it forward to the school board to consider. • The committee will consider this idea and bring it back to January meeting. 8. DRPS Safety Committee Update — Dec 61h meeting was pushed out to January so there were no updates to provide. Page 13 Internal 9. Work Plan Review & Upcoming Projects • Pinder will send out an email with a copy of the plan so that everyone has it for the January meeting. • Group agreed that the bursary program as one area of focus for next year. • Committee members are interested in having swag that can be handed out during Clarington events. Pinder will look into the cost of purchasing some items. • Members discussed the importance of the Committee to look at ways to influence the community events that are hosted across Clarington and make them more diverse and inclusive, including those that are hosted by other organizations. • Ron stated that there is significant amount of time prior to the Canada Day festivities to demonstrate different cultures and entertainment • Members agreed that since this is an advisory committee, would have to make the recommendations to council to push it back to businesses. • Work plan — add into the plan what events are run throughout the year and see which ones are in the municipal control. Pinder will take any suggestions back and work with the community development department. • It was decided that during the January meeting, a significant amount of time needs to be spent on finalizing the top committee priorities for 2024. • Pinder will update the work plan to include a couple of extra columns, including priority and timeline columns. 10.Anti-Black Racism Task Force Name Change Moved to January meeting. 11.Anti-Black Racism Task Force Terms of Reference The ABR committee has passed the following two motions: 1. That the terms of reference for Clarington's Anti -Black Racism Task Force be updated to include a 2-year term for the Co -Chair position and that the Co -Chair represent Clarington's Black community. 2. That the terms of reference for the Anti -Black Racism Task Force be updated to require that the majority of members identify as Black, and priority be given to Black applicants. Pinder provided some context for the conversation: o The Anti -Black Racism committee is not legislated by Council or the provincial gov't like the Accessibility Advisory Committee — that legislation includes that majority of members must identify as having a disability. o The committee does not report to Council but to the Diversity Advisory Committee. o The committees Terms of Reference states that its' goal is to "focus strategies through education and awareness on anti -Black racism and other forms of racism." Tenzin reminded the members that since the committee was created by DAC and members are appointed by DAC, it is this committee's decision to approve these two motions. Dione stated that as a black individual would want to make sure that the people making the decisions would be from the community and not from other communities. Page 14 Internal • Pranay supports the idea of having majority of members be from the black community but asked what would happen when the committee can't meet the ratio? Does that mean the committee wouldn't exist or be able to complete their work plan? • Members agreed that if the committee doesn't have the numbers then would need some kind of wording that would still allow DAC to create the committee and do the work. • Tenzin stated Terms of Reference don't specify who has to serve on the committee. Wouldn't be comfortable in supporting the motion as it's worded right now in case, the committee can't meet the majority members needing to be black. • Aaliyah — important to have representation but also important to have other members on the committee. • Joe asked if something comes up in relation to another group, then how do we address the other forms of racism? • Lauren indicated that there were a number of racism issues that weren't related to just Black community and the committee wasn't sure why it was coming to them. She stated that she does not want to water down the committee and should keep it as ABR but perhaps add other anti -race committees. • One solution could be to have a black member from the DAC committee to join the ABR committee as back-up if they are short members in certain months. • Pranay made the motion to defer this discussion to next month; seconded by Ron. Carried 12.Other Business Review Oath of Office: Move to next meeting Motion to adjourn made by Joe; seconded by Ron Carried Next meeting: January 11, 2023 Page 15 Internal