“Can’t stop. Won’t stop.” Pillar staff had the opportunity this week to attend and observe the AGM of a member organization, and these were the words of its executive director, a firm commitment to move forward relentlessly in the face of extraordinary challenges.
Can’t stop. Won’t stop. It’s how we feel about advocating for our sector, our member organizations, our team and the communities and people that all of us serve.
Today, Pillar made a written submission to the Standing Committee on Finance and Economic Affairs with six priority areas and 24 specific policy recommendations identified by our members, including investments in truly affordable and supported housing, health care teams, women’s economic well-being, reconciliation, anti-racism, green transition, and critical support for our sector, including mechanisms for emergency funding and long-term cross-sectoral collaboration. Six priority areas and 24 recommendations that will be central to achieving a just Ontario for all.
Echoing our co-presentation to the pre-budget hearings, our written submission makes the case that real progress in solving our wicked problems requires swift investments on all fronts, that none of us will succeed unless we all succeed. Pillar’s Executive Director Mojdeh Cox will also press this case tomorrow in a meeting with Ontario Finance Minister Peter Bethlenfalvy.
Pillar’s strategic plan binds us and emboldens us to put equity, change and recovery into action: to acknowledge our shared complicity in anti-Black and anti-Indigenous racism and all intersecting oppressions, and drive ourselves and our network to action; to work together across sectors and shift inequitable structures and systems to create transformational change; and to promote an equitable and sustainable recovery that addresses the inequities exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic.
This requires advocacy – to funders and to policy makers at every level of government. In this moment, it has meant taking every opportunity to shape the 2022 Ontario budget, our next best hope for immediate and sustained relief for the people we serve, our teams and our organizations.
We deeply appreciate that our members are raising and joining their voices together in so many ways during this consultation opportunity. We believe deeply in the transformative power of collaboration and co-design, of ‘nothing for us without us.’ We have learned much about you, about your communities and about how we can continue to deepen our relationships through our shared advocacy. With federal budget consultations ahead and elections at the provincial and municipal level this year, there is work ahead. And as Mojdeh says, “With who else would we do this work but our colleagues.” Solidarity.
Read Pillar Nonprofit Network’s 2022 Provincial Pre-Budget Submission, “A Just Ontario for All.”
Pillar Member Provincial Pre-Budget Submissions
Learn more about the priorities that Pillar members are advocating for when it comes to the provincial budget in their written submissions.
- Alzheimer Society Ontario with Alzheimer Society Southwest Partners
- CMHA Thames Valley Addiction and Mental Health Services
- L'Arche London
- London InterCommunity Health Centre Remarks to the Finance Committee
- Middlesex London Food Policy Council
- Neighbourhood Legal Services London & Middlesex
- United Way Elgin Middlesex, London Community Foundation, Westminster College Foundation and Sisters of St. Joseph in Canada
- London Arts Council