Hamilton residents keeping communities strong

Hamilton residents are responsible for improving local communities but more work needs to be done at the policy level to keep the city moving, said a new report released Tuesday.

Hamilton's Vital Signs is an annual report from the Hamilton Community Foundation that looks at developments in several areas of the city over the last year including health, the arts, the environment, immigration and safety.

The report shows local residents have succeeded at developing neighbourhood plans to engage citizens and make better connections to local institutions.

"It all suggests that if we continue to engage, we can make a difference," said Terry Cooke, HCF president and CEO.

Cooke said the recent neighbourhood planning meetings organized by grassroots community organizations, like the Beasley Neighbourhood Association, and hosted by city hall, as an example.

"They were powerful, they were informed, mature and sophisticated grassroots groups that challenged leaders but also extended the hand of partnership," Cooke said.

The report flagged areas that need greater focus — the gap between the rich and the poor and the impact poverty has on personal health.

"There is 21-year life expectancy gap between affluent and impoverished areas. That's because we're not performing well with health outcomes," Cooke said. "Frankly, as a society we know what we need to do about that stuff and have just not engaged at a level necessary to fix some of these things."

Cooke said there are areas of optimism. Our arts community is booming and has become an economic driver. Air quality has steadily improved over the past 20 years, Cooke said.

But continued success means there needs to be policy and planning decisions to support the work of Hamilton's strong neighbourhoods.

"We need to have a community conversation and use evidence and information constructively so its not a finger pointing exercise but one that says that we know where the trajectory is positive and know where its negative," Cooke said.

This includes drawing on experiences from

"We need to understand that it's a long game," Cooke said. "These challenges are not going to happen overnight, but if we stay at it long enough, lives can be affected and improved."

The full report is available on the Hamilton Community Foundation website.

Getting started:

Newcomers to Hamilton have doubled unemployment and poverty rates of non-immigrants in the last year. This is despite the fact non-immigrants have more education. Youth unemployment is below the Ontario average. As the number of business start-up grows, the number of people moving to Hamilton increases.

Health and well-being:

Hamilton is above the provincial average in obesity and teen pregnancy. Our obesity rate is 60 per cent, eight points higher than the provincial and national average. Life expectancy, babies with low birth weight and teen pregnancy vary between neighbourhoods.

Housing:

The average house price continues to climb to an increase of 12 per cent in 2010. The rental market continues to be the most affordable in the province with vacancies above the healthy range. The number of people waiting for social housing has climbed over the past three years.

Learning:

Rates of high school and post-secondary competition are improving, but still below the provincial average. Standardized test performance is slightly lower than the provincial average, but it varies by school.

Safety:

Property crime rates continue to decline, but violent crimes showed a slight increase. Domestic violence cases reported to police increased between 2007 and 2010. Reported cases increased from 3,798 from 2,189 — that's an increase of 70 per cent.

Work:

The percentage of full-time jobs has increased and the number of Employment Insurance claimants has decreased below pre-recession levels. Average earnings for women have increased, while earnings for men have decreased. More Hamiltonians are working for less than the living wage.

Arts and culture:

Hamiltonians are more culturally active. Supercrawl and Festival of Friends continue to see increased attendance, at 50,000 and 250,000 respectively.

More artists are choosing to make their homes in Hamilton — the population of artists has increased 22 per cent in the last 15 years.

We're starting to take care of our heritage: The number of individual heritage properties rose by 12 per cent over the last decade to 241 properties.

Volunteerism and charity:

Hamiltonians volunteer at a greater rate (52 per cent) and donate to charity (24 per cent) more than the provincial and national average.

Community spirit sits at 67 per cent, and life satisfaction sits at 92 per cent.

Leadership:

Hamilton, like much of Ontario, is lagging when it comes to the diversity of its leadership, with women and visible minorities being under-represented.

Only three women were elected in the 2010 municipal election in Hamilton.

The last visible minority politician elected provincially or federally in Hamilton was Lincoln Alexander in 1980.

Economy:

Hamilton's employment picture is improving, with a 1.8 per cent increase in 2011, putting Hamilton on par with Toronto and above the provincial and national average.

Since 2009, jobs in manufacturing and construction have gone up 5.5 per cent, while service sector jobs have gone up by 3.9 per cent.

We're seeing a spike in construction: 2010 represented a record year, seeing $1.1 billion worth of building permits issued. By 2011, however, that boom had levelled out with only $336 million in building permits being issued in the first half of the year.

Consumer and business bankruptcies are down to the lowest levels in four years.

Environment:

Hamiltonians are conserving water better. The 50 per cent decline in usage over the past decade is on account of universal water metering, rate increases, and greater civic awareness about conservation.

Air quality is improving, with only two days of poor air quality in 2011, vs an average of 16 days annually in 2002-2007. 


Reduced pollution also means Hamilton beaches are open 82 to 91 per cent of the time for swimming, more than the 80 per cent desired by local leaders.

Poverty:

Income disparity remains a central issue in Hamilton, with virtually no change in the distribution of wealth in a decade. The poorest 20 per cent of Hamiltonians still have 5 per cent of total income, while the richest 20 per cent still have 41 per cent of the total income.

More than 50 per cent of kids in some Hamilton neighbourhoods live in poverty.

Hamilton's social assistance caseload is at an all-time high, increasing by 40 per cent since 2009. More than 30,000 people, 38 per cent of whom are children, are reliant on Ontario Works.

Getting Around:

Seventy per cent of Hamiltonians work in the city, with another 12 per cent heading to Burlington to work.

The average commute is about 8.3 km

More Hamiltonians drive farther to get to work too, with about 16 per cent of residents commuting 30 km or more to work, which is higher.