Hamilton Musings

Do we have the courage to make quantum leaps of change in our communities?  Often, we have focused on change through short term interventions.  There is a focus on reporting outputs rather than outcomes and in the short term, even outcome reporting is not at the level of deep and durable change?

How do we really attack complex issues such as poverty reduction.  At the Hamilton Roundtable for Poverty Reduction we are often asked what our 'target' is - how many children and youth do we want to move out of poverty in the next year, three years, five years.  Our aspiration is to 'Make Hamilton the Best Place to Raise a Child' and with 24% of children under 14 living in families below the low-income cutoff - we are far from the aspiration - but bold enough to be on the path.   

Our answer has been, having any child living in poverty in Hamilton is unacceptable.  How can we choose?  If we were to focus on a certain percentange - 10 - 20 - 30% are we saying that for the other 70% it is okay that they are still living in poverty? 

But the faith of sticking to this vision - that poverty for any child is unacceptable - is challenging in these days of outputs, outcomes and results. 

A quantum leap for change - is to boldly say that our 'target for poverty reduction' is 100%.  We would be satisfied with no less.  And truly, how can we be satisfied with less.

But what about the nay-sayers?  Those who will claim that this is unrealistic - unachievable. 

We need to reframe - rethink and take these quantum leaps.  At the same time, identify the milestones along the way.  A bold  and courageous vision.