Hello Anne Marie,
For about the last seven years we have been working in collaboration with the Business Improvement Area in Downtown Ottawa on an initiative to generate employment for street youth (now called Rideau Street Youth Enterprises or RSYE).

The project got started when the merchants and the City and Municipal governments finally agreed on a plan for a major redevelopment of Rideau Street in the heart of downtown.  We worked together with a Regional Councillor to initiate a discussion on the social impacts of this change.  Many of the merchants were hoping the street people would "disappear", but this was not going to happen since Rideau St. is in very close proximity to the shelters for the homeless.  After several meetings, it was decided that the merchants, social agencies and politicians would work together on an initiative to provide employment opportunities for street youth.  The merchants even allocated some money from the funds for the redevelopment to start off the project.

Since then RSYE has grown.  For a couple of years it ran a recycling program that served about 200 customers in the downtown core (picking up, sorting and recycling all kinds of paper products), and providing a long-term (9 month) employment experience for the youth.  Another major initiative was clean-up after the ice storm, where groups of youth were trained in the operation of chain saws and did an amazing job cleaning up much of the damage around the Ottawa area.  Now, many of the youth are doing contracts for the City of Ottawa and City Living (the municipal social housing authority) doing maintenance and clean-up.  RSYE has also initiated some interesting projects with the local school board and Industry Canada on the development of web sites (which also had the goal of helping the youth to develop their literacy skills).  We are still trying to develop educational programs that address the needs of these youth.

Over the last 3 years RSYE has worked with about 100 youth per year and generated about 30,000 hours of employment for youth every year.  Most of the revenue for operations comes through contracts for services, although it has not been possible to cover the full costs of the operation.  RSYE has tried to operate as a non-profit business with clear social goals, which has been a great challenge.

I'd be very interested in learning more about your work with the business community in Saint John.

Cheers,
Ken Hoffman
Director, Community Health Promotion
Sandy Hill Community Health Centre