A Clearing House of Neighbourhood Houses in Metro

VancouverINSPIRE 2014

International Neighbourhood House & Settlement ConferenceVancouver, BC, Canada

Miu Chung Yan, Ph.D.Rory Sutherland, MSW Candidate

The University of British ColumbiaSchool of Social Work

NHiMV Project• First systematic study of NHs in Canada• Four years, collaborative, funded by

SSHRC• Research questions:

– “How do neighbourhood houses, as place-based, multi-service, community-governed, non-profit organizations, affect social equity, collective efficacy, and inclusion, based on the cases of Metro Vancouver?”

• Project Website: http://nhvproject.ca

Literature Review• Settlement House concepts:

– Locally governed, multiservice, accessible, mobilization of local resource, volunteer-heavy, nurturing users to serve.

• Recent challenges– Over-relied on government funding

• program-based, insensitive to local needs• Purposes of the study

– Providing a background for a larger study– How true are NHs to the SH concepts?– How much are NHs relying on government funding?

Questions to be answered?• Are they multiservice? If so, what kind of

services are they providing?• How accessible are they?

– Opening hours, fee, service users, languages spoken

• Who are governing the NHs?• Who are the staff?• How extensive is volunteer participation?• How much do they rely on government

funding?

Neighbourhood Houses: Metro Vancouver

• Kitsilano NH• Frog Hollow NH• Mt Pleasant NH• Little Mountain

NH• Cedar Cottage

NH• Marpole Place

NH• South

Vancouver NH• Collingwood

NH

North Shore NH• Kiwassa NH• Downtown

Eastside NH• Gordon NH

Burnaby NH

Oak Ave NH

Alexandra NH

Marpole NH

Methodology• N=15• Questionnaire• Challenges (information on human

capital):– UBC Ethics requirement – infeasible to ask for

information from each employee and volunteer of NHs – bulk information from each NH, technical support from survey monkey on request• Board: n=128, 81%, 50% - 100%• Staff: n=745, 75.7%, 57.3% - 100%

– Not all NHs have detailed information of all volunteers – estimate

Are NHs multiservice?

Total No of Programs:

N=444

Service TargetsTotal number

of participants

(in frequency) =

208,664

Are they accessible?1. Membership System:

a. Individual Membership Fee: $1-$15b. Senior Membership Fee (N=3): $1-$3c. Family Membership Fee (N=7), $5-$20

2. Main Premise (permanency and stability):a. Own, N=5b. Lease, N=10 (mainly governments) ($1-$83,569)

3. Hours Open:a. Average Hours per Week: 51.2 (S.D=16, Median 53,

Mode 54)b. Evening Hours per Week: N=11, 12.5 Hours, N=4, in

need.

Are they accessible? (2)

Total languages spoken by staff: 53

Who are governing the NHs?• Gender: Female: N=84 (65%); Male: N=45, (35%)• Age:

<25, N=8 (6.3%) 41-50, N=31(24.6%) >60, N=21(16.7%) 25-40, N=42(33.3%) 51-60, N=24(19%)

• Language spoken: N=24English N(nhs)=15; French N=9; Spanish N=8; Chinese N=5; Hindi N=4

• Years of Service to the Board<3 Yrs, N=69 (54%) 5-10 Yrs, N=26 (20%); 3-5 Yrs, N=27 (21%) 10 Years, N=7 (5%)

• Occupations: (Top five)Management/Business/finance/administration (N=47); Social science/education/gov’t (N=22); retired (N=15); Arts/culture/recreation (N=10); Sales and service (N=9)

Who is governing the NHs? (2)

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 150%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

Percentage of Board Members that Identify as a Visible Minority

Census DataBoard Data

Metro Vancouver Neighourhood Houses

Who is governing the NHs? (3)• Immigrant status of Board Members:

– Canadian Born: N=94 (73%)– Immigrant >10 years: N=27 (21%)– Immigrant 6-10 years: N=3 (2%)– Immigrant <6 years: N=4 (4%)

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 150%

20%

40%

60%

80%

Number of Board Members that Identify as Immigrants

BoardCensus Data

Who is governing the NHs? (4)• Former/Existing NH Service Users:

– Never, N=110; Active User, N=43; Former User, N=16

• Live/Work in the Neighbourhood (more than one choice, N =110)– Current residents N=88– Former residents N=15– Working in neighbourhood N=31– Used to work in NH N=13– Live and work in NH N=21– Used to live and work in NH N=11– Others N=17

Who are the staff?• Gender: Female: N=619 (65%); Male: N=114, (35%)• Age: <25, N=90 (12.8%) 41-50, N=160(22.8%) >60, N=31(4.4%)

25-40, N=295(42%) 51-60, N=126(17.9%)

• Ethnicity: N=25 Top 5: Canadian (N=194), Chinese (N=103), Latin American (N=33), South Asian (N=32), Filipino (N=25)

• Highest Level of Education:1. Up to High school diploma N=104 (14.9%)

2. Up to College Diploma N=319 (45.7%)3. Up to Undergraduate degree N=192 (27.5%)4. Up to Post—graduate degree N=83 (11.9%)– Early childhood edu (22.8%); Children and youth service (16.5%),

Social service related (21.5%), Business related (5.4%), Social Work (5.2%)

Who are the staff? (2)

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 150%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

Percentage of Staff Members that Identify as a Visible Minority

Census DataStaff Data

Metro Vancouver Neighourhood Houses

Who are the staff? (3)• Immigrant status of Staff Members:

– Canadian Born: N=324 (50.5%)– Immigrant >10 years: N=202 (31.5%)– Immigrant 6-10 years: N=65 (10.1%)– Immigrant <6 years: N=49 (7.6%)

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 150%

20%

40%

60%

80%

Number of Staff Members that Identify as Immigrants

Staff DataCensus Data

Who are the staff? (4)•  Former/Existing NH Service Users:

– Never: N=273 (37.2%)– Active User: N=311 (42.4%)– Former User: N=150 (20.4%)

•  Currently Living in the Neighbourhood?– Current residents N=321 (43.1%)– Former residents N=93 (12.5%)– Others N=331 (44.4%)

Who are the staff? (5)• Years of Service:

1. <3 Years N=254 (34.5%)2. 3-5 Years N=176 (23.9%)3. 5-10 Years N=190 (25.8%)4. >10 Years N=116 (15.8%)

• Employment Status: Regular: N=650; Contract: 140Regular staff:1. 35 or more hrs per week N=352 (44.6%)2. 21 or more hrs per week N=178 (22.5%)3. 11-20 hrs per week N=60 (7.6%)4. Less than 10 hrs per week N=60 (7.6%)Positions: Managerial (15.8%), Program Staff (45.7%), Support staff (9.3%), Others (7.1%)

What kind of volunteer participation?

1. Volunteer registration system: N=15

2. Total registered volunteers: >3,672 people, average 250 people per NH

3. Average 15,000 volunteer hours per year at each NH

4. No of Programs served: N=360 (83%)

5. Gender: 70% Female, 30% Male

6. Major languages: Chinese (N=12nh), Spanish (N=11), Korean (N=7), Vietnamese/Tagalog (N=6)

0.6%

23%

55%

22%

Age Groups

Children %Youth %Adult %Senior %

How much do they rely on government funding?

Fede

ral

Prov

incial

Muncip

al

United

Way

F/C O

rg

Gaming Fe

e

Donat

ion

Others

0

4,000,000

8,000,000

12,000,000

16,000,000

2.2

15.4

2.91.6 1.3 1.4

10.7

0.51.4

Total Funding by Source

Fund

ing

in D

olla

rs

How much do they rely on government funding? (2)

Federal Provincial Municipal UWFG0

20406080

100120140160180200

Total Metro Vancouver NH Program Funding by Type

Ongoing

Renewable >3yr

Renewable <3yr

Non Renewable >3yr

Non Renewable <3yr

How much do they rely on government funding? (3)

Fed go

v’t

Prov g

ov’t

City go

v’t

United

Way

Gaming

Found

ation

sFee

Others

66

182

133

7486

57

135

96

Program Funding Sources

Num

ber o

f pro

gram

s

Discussion and Implications• Neighbourhood house inherited from the tradition

of the Settlement House Movement but they are no longer a settlement house– No resident stationed and relying on government

funding

• Place-based nature– Multiservice: meeting local needs

• Reflection of local population (language serve, ethnicity, immigrant status among staff and volunteers, but not the board)

– Locally governed (Boards) and locally operated (staff)– Volunteer participations: mobilization of local resources

• Participation pathway: volunteers/service users to board/staff

– Permanency of infrastructure: psychological attachment

Discussion and implications (2)• Funding challenges

– Reliance on government funding– Short-term funding (program-based)

• Lack of core funding• Human resources

– Staff turn-over (instability)• Part-time, contract position

– Over or under-professionalized?• Staff with training• Minimum social work presence

Discussion and implications (3)• Diversifying funding sources:

– social enterprise?– local donations?– service coalitions to secure service contract– Creative marketing to local residents and politicians

• Keeping a strong community tradition– Reposition NHs as place-based mechanism with dual

function: service delivery and community development– Actively induce community development/organizing

components in programming • Diversifying leadership

– Ethnoracial equity in managerial level: unknown– Nurturing leadership among ethnic minorities and

immigrants in the membership and neighbourhood

For More Information of the Findings and the Project,

Please Visit Our Website: www.nhvproject.ca

Or Contact

Dr. Miu Chung Yan at miu.yan@ubc.ca.