FAQ: Pathways to Community Safety Workshop
Can I see all of the application questions before I get started?
Yup here are all of the questions. For the longer responses we are asking for about 200 words (a paragraph or two) or you can respond in a voice memo of about 1-2minutes.
- What is your name?
- What is your email address?
- Confirm your email address, by adding it a second time.
- In which city, town, reserve or region do you currently work?
- Who are you working with or for (an organization, initiative, collective, program etc)?
- You are active in urban, regional or community planning (yes/no)
- You are active in community safety organizing including abolition, restorative or transformative justice (yes/no)
- You work in territories that host Canada (yes/no)
- You will be available to participate both Saturday and Sunday of the workshop (yes/no)
- From your perspective what is one key way we can build community safety?
- What are some key things you want to learn from participating in the workshop?
- What are some key things you would like to contribute to the workshop?
- Tell us something about yourself you would like us to know
(who are you, your community, what relevant experiences will you bring with you to the workshop) - To get ready for the photo exhibition take and share 1-2 example photographs and a caption for each (100 words, a sentence or two) that respond to one or more of these prompts:
+How do you work towards community safety in your position?
+What challenges do you confront in working towards community safety?
+What makes you feel safe and/or unsafe in your community? - If you are not selected to participate in the workshop, would you still be interested in participating in the photo exhibition? (yes/no/maybe)
How do I apply?
- Complete the questions in this Google Form.
Do I have to prepare a presentation?
- Nope, rather than a formal conference, this is a workshop where all you have to bring is your questions and experiences so far and a readiness to share.
What will happen after I apply?
The research team will review applications and try to select participants to balance between different locations and experiences. Based on the feedback from the information session we will send out invitations to participants asking folks to send a short bio we can share with all of the invited participants so that invited participants have a sense of who else might be coming to the event before confirming participation.
We'll also ask you to submit your final images for the photo exhibition before arriving in Ottawa.
We'll also ask you to submit your final images for the photo exhibition before arriving in Ottawa.
Where is the funding for this coming from and how is it being spent?
The workshop is funded through a SSHRC Connection grant, alongside matching in-kind and financial support from research partners, and our universities. None of the research team is receiving additionally payment for organizing the workshop.
SSHRC (Social Science and Humanities Research Council) is a Government of Canada organization that funds research at Canadian universities. The Connection program is for events that share and extend ideas from ongoing research projects.
We will use our funding to share what we are learning in the Planning for Abolition research project, and to hold space for people working in, and committed to abolition to come together across different areas to exchange knowledge with each other.
The grant is ~25,000 dollars, and the proposed budget is as follows:
SSHRC (Social Science and Humanities Research Council) is a Government of Canada organization that funds research at Canadian universities. The Connection program is for events that share and extend ideas from ongoing research projects.
We will use our funding to share what we are learning in the Planning for Abolition research project, and to hold space for people working in, and committed to abolition to come together across different areas to exchange knowledge with each other.
The grant is ~25,000 dollars, and the proposed budget is as follows:
- 7% to pay current students at UofT and Carleton who will support with the logistics and evaluation of the event.
- 9% travel to Ottawa for the students and some of the research team.
- 44% travel for participants (practitioners in abolition organizing and planning). This includes limited funds for childcare or family support for participants with additional needs. Additional travel funds will come from university matching support.
- 8% honoraria for the non-profit team members who will lead the media workshop on Sunday, and the filmmakers who will present their work on Friday.
- 18% for meals for participants and the research team during the workshop.
- 14% for the community spaces where the event takes place, and transportation for the participants to and from the different venues.
What do you all mean be abolition?
We mean working towards community safety, thriving and liberation without policing (including uniformed police, alongside other forms of surveillance, violence and state violence), and prisons (including immigration detention and the institutionalization for people labelled with developmental, intellectual or psychiatric disabilities).
The project isn't interested in actions that fall into the category of reformist reforms that put more resources into policing, to borrow a term from Critical Resistance, but it also isn't a state abolition project.
As Ruth Wilson Gilmore puts it "if those rules [or expectations for living together in freedom] resolve as something called a state that provides clean water, free health care and so forth I am all for it." This perspective on the possibility for what states could/should be comes from the examples of Third World Independence and Liberation movements, and our experiences learning from and organizing with people in places with failed states.
The project isn't interested in actions that fall into the category of reformist reforms that put more resources into policing, to borrow a term from Critical Resistance, but it also isn't a state abolition project.
As Ruth Wilson Gilmore puts it "if those rules [or expectations for living together in freedom] resolve as something called a state that provides clean water, free health care and so forth I am all for it." This perspective on the possibility for what states could/should be comes from the examples of Third World Independence and Liberation movements, and our experiences learning from and organizing with people in places with failed states.
What do you mean by planning?
We include formal and professional urban and regional planning around land use, transportation, policy, housing and economic development, as well as community planning, and folks providing direct services in communities. This might mean working for municipalities or other governments, in the private sector, for a non-profit, or community-based organizations.
Here are some other resources and perspectives on planning.
Here are some other resources and perspectives on planning.
Will there be people who work in government at the workshop?
Urban planners often work for municipalities, but no one is representing their employer at the workshop. Instead the goal is to come together to think about how we can make systems change at the root in our jobs, volunteer and community-based work.
How do I know this is a safe space for my people?
We can't guarantee that things will go perfectly, but we are inviting participants who are committed to community safety without policing, and ready to work across difference including not holding stereotyped views of people based on histories of criminalization or career choices. We will also work to establish and revise agreements for discussion and working together throughout the workshop, work slowly, and take a transformative justice approach if (when) harms occur.
How do we guarantee community knowledge won't be co-opted?
The goal of the workshop is an exchange of knowledge, so it is ideal for community organizers who feel that learning more about the planning process could be valuable in their work, and for planners that feel that learning more about abolition, restorative and transformative justice organizing could be valuable in theirs.
So the aim is mutual learning where all participants have the opportunity to contribute their knowledge and learn from others. How what we learned is shared beyond the workshop is part of the work we will do together in producing mini-podcast episodes, and in follow-up sessions.
We'll also aim to evaluate the session thinking about how learning happens between a diverse group of people. We're working out the details of that now, and all participants will be invited to participate in that evaluation, but you do not have to be a part of the evaluation to participate in the workshop.
So the aim is mutual learning where all participants have the opportunity to contribute their knowledge and learn from others. How what we learned is shared beyond the workshop is part of the work we will do together in producing mini-podcast episodes, and in follow-up sessions.
We'll also aim to evaluate the session thinking about how learning happens between a diverse group of people. We're working out the details of that now, and all participants will be invited to participate in that evaluation, but you do not have to be a part of the evaluation to participate in the workshop.
What comes after this? How will you stay in touch and support us?
At the end of the convening we will come together to describe what next steps we all want to take and think about what supports we might need to take those steps. We will meet again virtually at least twice as a group to see how the work is going and continue brainstorming around additional possible actions.