SUPPORTS ITEM NO. 1
CS&B COMMITTEE AGENDA
JUNE 13, 1996
ADMINISTRATIVE REPORT
Date: May 21, 1996
TO: Standing Committee on City Services and Budgets
FROM: Director of Community Services, Social Planning
SUBJECT: Grant Request: Vietnamese Family Worker
RECOMMENDATION
THAT Council approve a grant of $29,100 (part-year funding) to
MOSAIC for a Vietnamese family support worker position, to be
developed in conjunction with Strathcona Community Centre;
sources of funds to be $20,000 from funds reserved from the 1995
Community Services Grant budget and $9,100 from the 1996
Community Services Grant budget.
GENERAL MANAGER'S COMMENTS
The General Manager of Community Services submits the foregoing
for CONSIDERATION.
COUNCIL POLICY
Approval of grant recommendations requires eight affirmative votes.
PURPOSE
This report recommends approval of a grant to strengthen support
services for Vietnamese families. The program will be managed by
MOSAIC and Strathcona Community Centre and will focus initially in the
Strathcona area (Appendix A: applicants' proposal).
A summary of staff findings regarding the availability of family
support and counselling services for people who need services in
languages other than English, is provided in Appendix B. This summary
provides a context for the proposed Vietnamese family support
position.
BACKGROUND
Council approved reserves in both the 1995 and 1996 Community Services
Grants budgets, for family support services for Vancouver residents
who require assistance in languages other than English ($20,000 in
1995 and $30,000 in 1996). Over the past 6-7 months, staff have
reviewed the availability of family support/counselling services,
identified service gaps, and developed strategies to begin to address
some of what we see to be the most critical areas. In our preliminary
discussions with other funders, several have expressed interest in
participating in some of the proposed strategies.
The review showed very limited and spotty availability of family
supports for people with no or limited English. There are some
support groups available at the community level, and various forms of
one-to-one "counselling", ranging from fairly informal to professional
family therapy. Their availability to those who need them, varies
widely. Different cultural communities also have quite different
needs.
To address some of what we see as the key immediate needs, and to
begin to develop a coherent service network, we are recommending 3
strategies:
- to support partnership projects between agencies which have
cultural expertise and connections, and professional counselling
resources, with the goal of broadening the availability of
professional counselling;
- to augment and co-ordinate community-based outreach and support
services for selected high-need communities; and
- to provide early family support to smaller, newer groups, with
the goal of preventing more severe family problems and helping
these groups connect with other community resources.
As opportunities have presented, we have recommended actions on two of
these strategies: a small Cross-Cultural Expertise grant to SUCCESS
and Family Services, to work on the professional counselling issue
(approved February, 1996); and a grant to Immigrant Services Society
to provide family support services to people from former Yugoslavia
(approved April 2, 1996).
The third strategy, involving community-based support services for
selected high-need communities, has taken some time to develop. It
was clear early on in the review that the Vietnamese community is a
high priority for service development and coordination. We took some
additional time to meet with agencies and people who are working with
this community, to determine needs in the family support area. The
recommendation for a new Vietnamese family outreach worker is the main
subject of this report.
DISCUSSION
Some communities such as South Asian, Latin- and Central-American, and
Vietnamese, have had significant numbers of arrivals in the past 10-15
years. They are past the "settlement" stage but do not necessarily
have access to the various social services which other Vancouver
residents can use. While the longer term goal is that most people
become able to access services in English, the shorter term reality is
that some key supports -- outreach to youth, family support services,
and seniors' services -- need to be in languages other than English in
order to be effective.
Some work has gone on in service development and coordination for
Spanish-speakers, and an initiative is currently underway to re-orient
and co-ordinate services for the South Asian communities. Some
services have also been developed for Vietnamese-speaking people but
the intensity of family problems indicates a need for more support and
a more stable, co-ordinated approach.
Two needs assessment reports co-ordinated by MOSAIC have identified a
variety of needs in the Vietnamese community. Some, such as
alcohol/drug counselling, are not within the City's mandate. However,
many of the issues identified related to families and children, and to
issues affecting youth.
At present, the key resources for Vietnamese families are two Family
Advancement workers (1-1 counselling for families with children); and
3-4 support groups for women. There is no affordable professional
family therapy and this does not seem to be a current priority. There
is also one youth outreach worker who focuses on older males (15 to 20
years).
The priorities we identified are:
- More family support, which would have an outreach capability and
use both 1-1 support and group work. At least two areas of the
city -- Strathcona and Mount Pleasant -- need more family
services. Most of the support groups are focused on women with
younger children. Additional groups focusing on the family
issues with older children, and some predictably-available
parenting groups are also needed.
- Better outreach to younger youth (9 - 13 years).
- Outreach to young women.
- More networking among the various services and a clearer vision
of direction.
The proposed family outreach worker, to be sponsored by MOSAIC in
cooperation with Strathcona Community Centre, will strengthen family
support services in one of the high-need areas, providing both
one-to-one support and group work. This worker will link with other
family support programs at Strathcona, and with the Vietnamese support
groups MOSAIC runs in the Britannia area. On a yearly basis, the
program budget will be $50,340 (1996 dollars) and the City grant
request $38,920. A pro-rated grant of $29,100 is recommended for the
first year. $20,000 will be provided from funds reserved from the
1995 Community Services Grant budget and the remaining $9,100 from the
1996 Community Services Grant budget (reserve for support to
multicultural families).
As a result of discussions with other funders, BC Settlement has
funded a part-time youth outreach worker for young women, for 1996.
Immigrant Services Society will supervise this new position, which
will be co-ordinated with the existing City-funded male youth worker.
In this year's grant process, the City's ongoing grant to MOSAIC was
re-oriented to provide community development support to 3 communities,
including the Vietnamese community. Several funders have expressed
interest in the longer-term support to community development and
service coordination work.
CONCLUSION
The recommended grant for a new Vietnamese family support worker is
part of a larger strategy, involving other funders, to respond to some
key needs for family support services in languages other than English.
* * * * *
APPENDIX B
FAMILY COUNSELLING AND SUPPORT IN LANGUAGES OTHER THAN ENGLISH
Background
In the 1995 Community Services Grants process, the City received two
new requests to fund family counselling/support services to immigrant
families. This was seen as an important area because support and
intervention can help to reduce serious family problems. In addition,
because this is a type of service which needs to be provided in the
language of the clients, current resources are very limited. Council
reserved a modest allocation for this service area, to allow time for
a staff assessment of the degree and types of need in various
communities. This is a complex area and the City is only one of the
possible funders for this work. The intention of the review was to
begin to develop a strategy through which all involved funders,
agencies and community groups could address some of the gaps and
inadequacies in service provision and coordination.
Social Planning staff have met over the past months with
representatives from a variety of organizations: Family Services of
Greater Vancouver, SUCCESS, Immigrant Services Society, North Shore
Counselling, Greater Vancouver Mental Health Services, Vancouver
School Board, MOSAIC, and Surrey Delta Immigrant Services, as well as
several individuals working with different communities. We have also
had some initial discussions with most of the funders in this service
area.
The discussion of needs was informative and quite consistent regarding
a general lack of services for immigrant families, and the
identification of several high-need communities. One of the central
service delivery questions which many groups are struggling with --
and about which there are various opinions -- is how to make services
truly accessible to people who need support in languages other than
English.
The following is the Social Planning staff summary and recommended
strategies, based on what we heard.
Social Planning Summary and Recommended Strategies
Current resources:
People who need family support services and who speak English have a
fairly broad choice of options ranging from professional family
counselling, through school-related programs, to a wide assortment of
support and self-help groups.
Appendix B - 2
For people who need support in languages other than English, there is
nothing resembling a service network and it is almost a matter of
chance whether any sort of support is available and accessible. This
is not to say that there are no resources, but rather that services
are very limited and spotty, both in the languages served and in
geographic availability.
There are currently three key avenues of support for Vancouver
families who are experiencing problems and who need services in
languages other than English. Social Planning staff see these
services as the potential core of a more coherent service network,
although at present, none of the three services is adequately or
broadly available. They are:
- professional family counselling
- support via Family Advancement workers
- ongoing support groups.
People also get assistance through home-school workers,
sporadically-available parenting groups, and on an ad hoc basis from a
variety of programs which are intended for other purposes, e.g., ESL
classes, training programs, and settlement workers. Settlement
workers, for instance, are not mandated to work in this area, but may
be called on by clients because there are no other resources available
in a certain language. A Ministry of Social Services community
development worker provides links and support to some of the smaller
cultural communities. There is also some specialized counselling
available in some languages other then English, e.g., family violence
counselling.
However, the overall picture is that people who need support in
languages other than English are not as well served as people who can
receive support in English. There are definite gaps and inadequacies,
and barriers to access. In some cultural communities, there are
serious and extensive problems and the need for additional family
support services is high.
The general picture for the 3 types of service which we see as key
family supports is as follows:
For affordable professional counselling, the main agencies are Family
Services of Greater Vancouver, SUCCESS and North Shore Family
Counselling. Jewish Family Services also has profes-sional
counsellors. Collectively, they have approximately 17.5 FTE (full
time equivalent) counsellors working in Vancouver. (The number is
approximate because some agencies have addi-tional counselling staff
in other municipalities, who sometimes serve Vancouver residents.)
These agencies provide some resources in Cantonese and Mandarin (4.5
FTE), and very limited resources in Spanish (0.2 FTE) and Hebrew.
There are waiting lists for all counsellors, including those working
in English. As far as we know, there is no affordable, professional
counselling available in Vancouver for people speaking languages other
than those noted above.
Appendix B - 3
The Family Advancement workers (funded by the Ministry of Social
Services), help to fill some of the deficiencies in other languages.
They provide counselling for many of the same issues that professional
family counselling would address, but the service is limited to
specific inner city schools and to families who have children in those schools. There are 16 Family Advancement workers in Vancouver, 8 of
whom provide services in languages other than English (3 in Spanish; 1
in Vietnamese; 2 in Punjabi; 1 in Cantonese; 1 in Khmer). Family
Services of Greater Vancouver has one additional Vietnamese staff who
works with the Family Advancement group but can serve Vietnamese
families anywhere in the city. Family Advancement is an effective
service, but there are many families who cannot access it because they
live outside of the inner city or lack an attachment to the right
school.
The third avenue for family support is via groups run at neighbourhood
houses and other similar locations. These tend to be mostly women's
groups. It appears that for most cultural groups, the initial opening
for discussion of family issues comes through the women. These groups
are a "safe" way for women to get information about and discuss
issues, and receive support. These groups have no stable funding. At
present, there are a number of Cantonese and Spanish groups, a few
Vietnamese, and a scattering of groups in a few other languages.
(Resources in Punjabi are currently in transition and have not been
tabulated.) One key point about these groups is that some communities
-- the Vietnamese community is a current case in point -- are much
more likely to use these less formal supports than they are to access
formal "professional" counselling. So for some communities, informal
outreach/ support is the key needed resource.
In summary, we have a scattering of un-co-ordinated programs providing
family support in languages other than English. Despite some progress
on the issue, "mainstream" professional counselling is primarily a
service in English. The Family Advancement program offsets this lack
to some degree, but is only available to parents who have children in
certain schools. The informal support groups are also important
resources but are the least financially stable. They tend to exist
thanks to the personal commitment and effort on the part of a few
individuals or agencies and they depend on shifting and fragmented
funding sources. There are big gaps geographically and for most
language groups.
How to proceed from here
Based on everything we heard, Social Planning staff are of the view
that no single solution will address the various gaps and needs. We
need a more co-ordinated approach by funders, and we need to develop
several different strategies which take into account the following key
factors:
Appendix B - 4
- Language/cultural groups vary widely in size, and this
factor coupled with limitations in resources/ funding,
affects how and where services can be delivered.
- Factors such as newness of arrival, the conditions causing
immigration, presence or absence of the same/similar
cultural group in Vancouver, all affect people's needs and a
response to them.
- Different communities need different types of help at
different moments of time. For instance, although
professional counselling is a very important service, it
appears that at this moment in time, it would be less useful
to establish professional counselling for Vietnamese
families than it would be to provide additional less formal
supports. Five years from now, this may no longer be true.
- While everyone agrees that understanding cultural factors is
important, agencies have different degrees of experience and
sophistication about cultural factors, and these differences
have an effect on the accessibility of service.
Proposed Strategies
Social Planning staff see three areas of intervention which, added to
existing services, and pursued over time with the support of other
funders, would provide a more equitable support system for non-English
speaking families. In each case, we are suggesting one community as
the focus for immediate work, and we have recommended a specific City
action. This does not imply the exclusion of other communities, or
that the needs for family support in other communities are adequately
met. We have focused on those communities where the combination of
needs and existing conditions, at this point in time, leads us to
think that the actions suggested will be effective.
1. Support the development of accessible professional counselling in
languages other than English
The concept of professional counselling is foreign to many
people, but it appears that at this point in time, addi-tional
bi-lingual, bi-cultural professional counsellors would be well
used by people speaking Cantonese/Mandarin and Spanish. Both
these communities have qualified professionals with strong
cultural expertise, but neither community has strong connections
to the so-called "main-stream" counselling agencies. The
Cantonese/Mandarin-speaking community is the only group which has
developed
Appendix B - 5
its own professional counselling services, via SUCCESS's
well-known and heavily used family counselling division. For
their part, agencies such as Family Services and North Shore
Counselling have some capacity in other languages, but as
agencies, are not well known in non-English speaking communities.
Social Planning staff are of the view that understanding cultural
issues is crucial to developing accessible counselling services,
and that the best way to overcome the various barriers within
both the communities and the agencies, is to involve people with
this understanding in the development and provision of services.
There now appears to be an opportunity for SUCCESS and Family
Services to undertake this type of work. Both organiza-tions are
providing professional counselling, and they have much to share:
SUCCESS has a depth of cultural understanding and contacts in the
Chinese community, and Family Services has staff training
resources and well-developed administrative and management
procedures. The two organizations have already done some work
together on staff training and case conferencing.
To support this direction, staff recommended a small
Cross-Cultural Expertise Grant to the two groups (approved by
Council in February 1996). We will be watching the progress and
results of this work with interest. In the future, it may be
possible to explore similar partnerships for other languages such
as Spanish and Punjabi.
2. Strengthen and co-ordinate the outreach and support-group network
for high-need communities.
There are several cultural communities with fairly substantial
numbers, who live in various areas of the city, and for whom some
form of community/inter-agency network would assist in both
community development and service development and coordination.
A service network is currently being developed in the South Asian
communities, and considerable community development and service
planning has been done via the Latin American Co-ordinating
Committee in the Spanish-speaking communities.
As noted earlier, there appears to be general agreement that
among the "mid-size" communities (Punjabi, Vietnamese and
Spanish-speaking), the Vietnamese community is a high priority
for additional support, and that strengthening the less formal,
community-based outreach/support services would be the best
approach. Agencies and front-line Vietnamese workers have
expressed strong concerns about the difficult and intense issues
Vietnamese families are experiencing, and the need to strengthen
supports for this
Appendix B - 6
community. Social Planning staff have met with involved agencies
and workers to develop a plan and job description for one new
full-time Vietnamese family outreach worker. This proposal will
be submitted to Council in the near future.
We think that the needs in the Vietnamese community easily
warrant several additional workers, as well as longer-term
support for the linking/co-ordination of services, and look to
other funders for this support.
3. Allocate resources to assist smaller, newer groups
For some smaller cultural groups, e.g., Kurds, Somalis, people
from former Yugoslavia, there may be very few resources apart
from the settlement workers at Immigrant Services Society (ISS)
and MOSAIC. For some newly arrived groups, the primary need is
settlement. But agencies indicate that some groups very quickly
come to a point of needing and being able to benefit from some
form of family counselling/support.
Like other funders, the City hesitates to fund "stand-alone"
ethno-specific services, and prefers instead to support
ethno-specific services which are linked to the broader network
of community services, e.g., City-funded Vietnamese, Latin
American and Chinese youth workers are linked to the Park Board
youth worker system. While we stand by this approach, it does
pose difficulties for groups who are unable -- for whatever
reasons -- to articulate their needs and develop partnerships
with other agencies.
In the case of smaller cultural groups who have family issues and
are ready to deal with them, it appears to us that providing some
intervention and family support at an early stage would help
prevent much more serious, entrenched problems later on. We see
immigrant-settlement and integration agencies as the logical
place to house such a resource because they have natural
connections with new groups and the greatest diversity in
bi-lingual, bi-cultural staff.
The general proposal is that agencies/communities identify which
newer/smaller group(s) are currently at this stage, and allocate
bi-lingual staff on a time limited basis (1-3 years) to provide
support to families and help them develop connections with other
services. At present, people from former Yugoslavia appear to be
one of the groups for whom such an approach would be helpful.
Council has now approved a 1996 Community Services Grant to
Immigrant Services Society to provide family support services to
this group. With some additional support from other funders,
Social Planning staff think that it would be possible to augment
and stabilize family support services at ISS to address issues in
at least one other newer community.
Appendix B - 7
Summary
In summary, the three strategies are:
- To fund strategic work aimed at building bridges and developing
partnerships between the agencies which have cultural
expertise/connections, and professional counsel-ling resources.
- To augment and support the co-ordination of community-based
outreach and support services for selected high-need communities.
- To provide some early family support to smaller, newer groups, in
order to prevent more severe family problems and to help these
groups connect with other community services.
* * * * *