Item - 2014.CD29.10

City Council on June 10, 11, 12 and 13, 2014, adopted the following:

1.         City Council adopt the Integrating Cities Charter, included in Attachment 2 of the report (April 2, 2014) from the Executive Director, Social Development, Finance and Administration, and direct that Toronto become a signatory of the Charter.

2.         City Council declare the day of the signing ceremony as Newcomer Day in Toronto. 

3.         City Council approve the implementation of the new activities outlined in the report (April 2, 2014) from the Executive Director, Social Development, Finance and Administration, including an anti-rumour campaign in Toronto and annual Newcomer Fair.

4.         City Council direct the Executive Director, Social Development, Finance and Administration, in consultation with the Newcomer Leadership Table, to continue to monitor the implementation of the Toronto Newcomer Strategy and provide annual progress reports to the Community Development and Recreation Committee.

5.         City Council request the Federal Government to:

a.         remove from Bill C-24 the amendment that eliminates the inclusion of pre-permanent residency time towards citizenship requirement for immigrants and refugees including Live-in-Caregivers, International Students, as well as those selected through the Provincial Nominee Program, and the Canadian Experience Class;

b.         amend Bill C-24 and recognize up to four years of pre-permanent residency time to be counted towards the citizenship requirement;

c.         give full credit (i.e., 1:1) to pre-permanent residency time spent within Canada;

d.         implement a 3-year transition period for coming into force of Bill C-24;

e.          delete from Bill C-24 the provision of intention to reside in Canada, the provision of new grounds for citizenship revocation, and the provision of restriction of access to the federal court;

f.          keep the language knowledge requirement to the current age group in the Citizenship Act (18-54 years old);

g.          reverse in Bill C-24 the application fee increase; and

h.          restore citizenship rights in Bill C-24 for second generation Canadians born abroad.

6.          City Council request the Deputy City Manager, Cluster A to engage with the Newcomer Leadership Table, and other stakeholders, to better understand and assess other impacts of the proposed changes to the Canadian Citizenship Act on Torontonians, settlement service providers, City services and other stakeholders.

7.         City Council adopt the recommendations of the Immigrant Friendly City Project, listed below, as a framework and direct the City Manager to report on a plan for the implementation of the recommendations at the February 2015 meeting of the Community Development and Recreation Committee, including the financial implications of the recommendations, as part of the Toronto Newcomer Strategy:

"Recommendations of the Immigrant Friendly City Project:

Recommendation 1: That the City of Toronto adopt a charter committing it to equity in access to service, inclusion in society, and the enjoyment of economic and social benefits by all residents.

Recommendation 2: That the City of Toronto develop and apply meaningful equity evaluation tools to systematically review services and programs to ensure they are accessible to all of Toronto’s residents.

Recommendation 3: That City divisions develop, publish, and widely distribute services plans, describing how they will identify and address barriers to immigrant access to services.

Recommendation 4: That City divisions create systematic, inclusive, and equitable processes for engaging diverse communities in service planning, implementation, and evaluation as well as delivery, and engage them in the basic planning processes and customer service standardization processes for every division and corporations as a whole.

Recommendation 5: That all City divisions develop and publish language plans that address linguistic access issues and assign accountability for delivering on that plan to the general manager of the division, with regular reports being made available to the public and key stakeholders.

Recommendation 6: That the City adopt, as corporate policy, the elimination of language barriers, and create corporate strategies to support divisions in achieving that goal.

Recommendation 7: That the City support partnerships between municipal staff and NGOs, community organizations, and cultural groups as well as to assist municipal staff in their systematic outreach to connect with immigrant communities, inform and include newcomers, and link new Torontonians to the systems and supports they need.

Recommendation 8: That the City use a variety of strategies, such as creating visible “welcome stations,” implementing outreach processes, developing partnerships, and establishing measurable goals and targets for engagement in order to reach, involve, and include immigrants in the full range of city processes.

Recommendation 9: That the City support municipal staff in forging partnerships with NGOs, community organizations, and cultural groups to enhance municipal efforts to facilitate civic engagement and system navigation.

Recommendation 10: That the City provide training to all staff and volunteers who deal directly with the public, integrating equity training, cultural appropriateness, anti-oppression and anti-racism into training for customer service.

Recommendation 11: That the City use its systems for tracking, measuring, and monitoring customer service to assess the creation of divisional plans that support access and inclusion for all communities, assess the implementation of those plans, and measurable outcomes, such as the rate of access to City services by immigrants, or the inclusion of immigrants in City processes. That evaluation systems include gathering and assessing disaggregated data in order to understand the specific ways in which race, gender, language, ability, culture, and citizenship status impede access to services and to provide for monitoring and accountability on these aspects of customer service.

Recommendation 12: That the General Manager in each division will be accountable for ensuring the development, implementation, measuring, and monitoring of immigrant-friendly divisional policies.

Recommendation 13: That the Toronto Newcomer Office and Office of Equity and Diversity be staffed and mandated to provide guidance, direction, and monitoring to support all divisions in meeting these goals.

Recommendation 14: That Toronto establish active strategies for ensuring that all communities are represented in the bodies that govern our city services. That Toronto create policies for our residents by partnering with organizations like the Maytree Foundation, which facilitate the participation of all communities.

Recommendation 15: That the City review community consultation procedures to ensure that processes designed to gain resident input are as oriented toward the needs and practices of new communities as they are to more established ones.

Recommendation 16: That the City broaden its partnership with the newcomer serving community to include not only settlement organizations and Local Immigration Partnerships, but also faith groups and cultural groups, in order to provide ongoing feedback on newcomer and immigrant issues.

Recommendation 17: That programs that support City staff in partnering with settlement services be facilitated and expanded, and that they be extended to include faith groups and cultural groups interested in sustainable partnership. 

Recommendation 18: That purchasing, employment and financial processes incorporate social procurement policies that identify and facilitate opportunities to leverage municipal purchasing power to facilitate the development of our diverse work force and our multicultural business community.

Recommendation 19: That Toronto look at its business regulation framework to identify ways to accommodate micro-business, promote economic development opportunities for new communities, and provide new entrepreneurs with the information they need to navigate our systems.

Recommendation 20: That Toronto advocate strongly with the federal government on immigration policy and the implementation of immigration laws and practices that protect the wellbeing of Toronto residents.

Recommendation 21: That Toronto actively communicate its advocacy efforts to the communities they are meant to support.

Recommendation 22: That Toronto, as the representative of the nation’s largest community of immigrants, continue to seek as large a place as possible at policy making tables affecting immigration and settlement issues."