Egos, not silos, are the issue

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 17/11/2023 (1039 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Making the decision to move away from my community of 43 years wasn’t easy for me.

While I was weighing out the pros and the cons of why I was considering a move, my heart was hurting for the underserved in Brandon. While I do feel that Brandon has made some strides in seeing its social issues, I believe it has a much longer path ahead toward actually accepting them.

During my 10 years of advocating for centralized services in Brandon for those struggling with a whole host of social issues, I had the pleasure of working with several Winnipeg advocates and community leaders. Their plans to meet the needs of the underserved in their community were in alignment with my own, and I advocated strongly for our community leaders to bring that vision to Brandon.

The vision I presented to our community for centralizing services was a Community Wellness Centre (CWC), which I conceptualized and shared widely with Brandonites and local politicians.

When I think of the millions of dollars that have been sprinkled around Brandon to “meet” the needs of the underserved, I can safely say that we could have been well on the way to a CWC. I had proposed The Town Centre as an ideal location for a CWC, and its owners were prepared to support the concept.

It was disheartening for me to learn that at the 11th hour, the underserved in Brandon are once again being denied service. The finger-pointing for this to be happening on the cusp of another winter is more than enough to go around.

Before anyone gets their dander up, I recognize there are many variables for this to be taking place, and I feel for those who have to deal with the fallout of these kinds of decisions.

Having said that, I will use a quote from the Brandon Sun’s Nov. 16 editorial, “Downtown needs vision for future,” that sums up, for me, a problem in Brandon that I also tried to address with the Community Wellness Collaborative: “This has been accompanied by social service and non-profit organizations that have tended in the past to work in silos, while failing to have clearly defined goals and outcomes to measure success.”

I understand that playing nice in the sandbox is an important piece of collaboration, but not when the playing nice takes priority over the needs of the underserved community.

It’s egos, not silos, that are the issue in Brandon. Unless and until that is understood, the underserved will continue to struggle.

My move to Winnipeg was threefold: to be closer to my son, to be part of progress for the underserved, and sadly, to not have to further witness unintended and intended disregard for those who need help the most.

I encourage the CWC to provide the service to Brandon that it was founded to do: “Collaborators of the CWC believe that confronting the intersectional challenges faced by community requires innovative and transformative action that empowers and complements existing services.

The CWC represents collaborators working in good faith to co-ordinate and support efforts that promote community wellness.”

Start there.

KIM LONGSTREET

Winnipeg