Where Are At With Social Procurement in Winnipeg?
For over two years, the We Want to Work coalition has been advocating for the City of Winnipeg to consider community benefits in their existing purchasing such as addressing poverty, supporting good jobs and employment, building sustainable local economies, and taking climate action. Before that, community builders have been encouraging the use of this Social Procurement practice at all levels of government, including the City, for many years more.
A major milestone was achieved by the City of Winnipeg in December 2020 when Winnipeg’s City Council voted to move forward with social procurement in city purchasing through this motion. The motion directed the City’s Public Service to report back on what Winnipeg is already doing and collaborate with social enterprises and industry on where we can go next.
Check out the news coverage here and here, as well as our submission for this motion here.
Between January and March, We Want to Work members and other community stakeholders were engaged by the City of Winnipeg public service. You can read more about the City’s public engagement process on this motion here.
We Want to Work members met with the City, attended a public engagement meeting, and sent in a written submission.
Our written submission called for a process that convenes a representative working group of community stakeholders to determine agreed-upon outcomes, policy processes, measurement tools, and pilot projects, as well as the proper resourcing by the City to have staff support social procurement.
On March 17th, 2021, Winnipeg’s Executive Policy Committee will consider a report from the Public Service and decide where to go next with Social Procurement. We Want to Work feels enthused about the Public Service’s recommendation to create a working group and some key next steps that align with our vision for a Social Procurement strategy and policy.
Read the Public Service report here, as well as an attached scan of comparable Canadian municipalities and a list of social procurement practices the city is already undertaking.
We will continue to work collaboratively with the City of Winnipeg and other community stakeholders toward the use of social procurement to achieve the social, economic, and environmental community benefits we care about most.