Introducing the Reconciliation Book Club

Next week at our June Conference in Penticton, we will be honouring National Aboriginal Day with the launch of The Federation’s Reconciliation Book Club! Many of our members have expressed that reading works by Indigenous authors has been one of the best ways to enhance their knowledge and inspire the courage to ...Read More

Editorial on BC’s residential resources for youth in care

This week, Bernard Richard shared his worries about what he describes as a “lack of appropriate ministry oversight” when it comes to staffed residential resources. In response, Minister Conroy has ordered a review of more than 800 children living in contracted agency homes in BC. The ...Read More

May Projects & Issues Update

Over the past few months, The Federation board members, staff team, and I have been focused on a number of ongoing projects and initiatives. We have been meeting with government colleagues and funders, bringing forward concerns, collaborating with sector colleagues, and tracking issues that affect our members and our sector. ...Read More

The CSS Health & Safety Handbook

Following three years of work, The Federation and our partners at the Community Social Services Employers’ Association of BC (CSSEA), WorkSafeBC, and the Community Social Services Bargaining Association (CSSBA), are pleased to jointly launch the Community Social Services Health & Safety Handbook. The Handbook is a fir ...Read More

Updated MCFD Caregiver Screening Policy

In December 2014, MCFD implemented a new caregiver screening policy. Since then, a number of Federation members faced challenges implementing the new requirements and, over the past three years, we have been working closely with MCFD to provide feedback from community organizations and to help the ministry identi ...Read More

The benefits of partnerships: Federation Insurance Products

The Federation believes that in order to be strong and sustainable, BC’s community social services sector must have access to high quality and affordable insurance products. That’s one big reason why our member agencies have access to a suite of comprehensive and reliable insurance programs and ...Read More

Award for Excellence Nominations 

Last week, I spoke about the Federation’s Youth Education Bursary and the way that it serves to welcome young people into our sector and our work. Today, I want to talk about our Award for Excellence and the related purpose it serves—recognizing and thanking the people who have stayed in the sector and committed their c ...Read More

BC’s new Employer Health Tax

One of the big changes revealed in the BC budget speech a few weeks ago was the announcement of a new progressive tax that will replace MSP premiums in our province. The BC Employers Health Tax, as it will be called, is slated to come into effect in January 2019. We know there are already many questions about how this tax wi ...Read More

Federation Champions: Supporting each other

As we were getting ready for February’s Social Policy Forum in Victoria, we came up with a simple new idea that we thought might help keep our provincial events affordable and accessible for our small- and medium-sized members. The Federation is constantly striving to support our members, but we wanted to test ...Read More

Youth Education Bursary: Supporting youth in care

As many of you know, The Federation’s Youth Education Bursary was an initiative that was actually established by Federation members. But you may not know that its creation was inspired by two different, but related intentions. The first (rather obvious) goal was to support young people in care—in particu ...Read More