Our community is changing. Our economy is growing and more people are moving to the Comox Valley. New immigrants and long-term residents are living side-by-side with aboriginal people, whose traditional territory we all inhabit. Students are learning in a global environment. Businesses are serving more diverse consumers. In addition, a growing labour shortage means we need to attract diverse new residents to maintain a viable, vibrant workforce.
What is a Welcoming Community?
A welcoming community has a strong desire to receive newcomers and to create an environment in which they will feel at home. A welcoming community ensures newcomers are able to participate fully in all aspects of community life. A welcoming community ensures newcomers have access to a full range of services and programs, and can find meaningful employment opportunities.
What is an Inclusive Community?
Inclusion is the art of ensuring people feel welcomed and celebrated for exactly who they are. This means all differences are viewed as unique gifts that an individual brings to a group. Inclusiveness exists when disadvantaged communities and minority group members share power and decision-making at all levels in projects, programs and institutions.
What Can We Do?
Inclusion of minority group members and integration of newcomers require a commitment on the part of the host community to build positive relationships and partnerships. Key components of fostering an inclusive and welcoming community include building on these relationships and enhancing existing models of cultural cooperation. It’s about all of us living, working and playing together with respect for one another in the context of our changing reality.
The community partners—Comox Valley Chamber of Commerce, ALC–Immigrant Settlement Office, Comox Valley Community Justice Centre, and Creative Employment Access Society—invite organizations to join us in developing a vision for a welcoming and inclusive Comox Valley.
Click here to read WelcomeBC's information sheet on the Welcoming and Inclusive Communities and Workplaces Program.
For more information on the Comox Valley Welcoming & Inclusive Communities Roundtable, contact:
Kathie Landry, Project Coordinator
(250) 286-3557 OR
(250) 334-3119
CEAS greatfully acknowledges the estate of E. J. Hughes for permission to use the painting "Comox Valley" as a symbol for this project.
