YIMBY Meeting 2019:
How to Talk About Social Determinants of Health
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Barrie is a city of people who take care of each other.
We need to learn How to Talk About Social Determinants of Health in a way that makes sense to our decision makers and neighbours, so they can more easily understand how to best take care of each other. |
On November 1, 2019, Redwood hosted another YIMBY-themed gathering - a 1/2 day session at the Simcoe County Museum. This meeting was a partnership between Redwood, the Simcoe County Alliance to End Homelessness (SCATEH), and the Simcoe County Poverty Reduction Task Group (PRTG).
It was the first snow of the season, but we had a great mix of interested stakeholders from across the social services sector. Dr. Lisa Simon from the Simcoe Muskoka District Health Unit is our local SDOH expert, and she kicked off our meeting with a presentation on what the SDOH are, and how they intersect with issues like homelessness, poverty, food insecurity, racism, mental health, addictions, and childhood development.
From there, we moved into discussions to develop key messaging that we can all use when talking to decision-makers to show how our work addresses these social determinants of health (also sometimes called addressing "root causes").
This gives us a common language and framework with which to educate decision-makers when advocating for policy and funding changes, and help them see how, across the sector, our numerous agencies have a common agenda.
We wanted to develop a simple message, say it right, and then say it over and over.
We made a lot of progress that day, but agreed to gather again in February 2020 to finalize the key messages. A smaller group gathered again on February 13th for a couple of hours. Our key message was further developed and at the request of the group, Redwood committed to creating a resource webpage by YIMBY week 2020, and providing a YIMBY website badge that interested agencies and organizations could display on their websites and link back to that webpage.
Resources:
It was the first snow of the season, but we had a great mix of interested stakeholders from across the social services sector. Dr. Lisa Simon from the Simcoe Muskoka District Health Unit is our local SDOH expert, and she kicked off our meeting with a presentation on what the SDOH are, and how they intersect with issues like homelessness, poverty, food insecurity, racism, mental health, addictions, and childhood development.
From there, we moved into discussions to develop key messaging that we can all use when talking to decision-makers to show how our work addresses these social determinants of health (also sometimes called addressing "root causes").
This gives us a common language and framework with which to educate decision-makers when advocating for policy and funding changes, and help them see how, across the sector, our numerous agencies have a common agenda.
We wanted to develop a simple message, say it right, and then say it over and over.
We made a lot of progress that day, but agreed to gather again in February 2020 to finalize the key messages. A smaller group gathered again on February 13th for a couple of hours. Our key message was further developed and at the request of the group, Redwood committed to creating a resource webpage by YIMBY week 2020, and providing a YIMBY website badge that interested agencies and organizations could display on their websites and link back to that webpage.
Resources:
On October 15, 2018, a group of close to 60 residents of Barrie gathered at the Southshore Community Centre to discuss how we could better respond to homelessness in our city, together. Learn more about that inaugural event here.
