The Windsor Post-Pandemic Healthy City Initiative

The Windsor Post-Pandemic Healthy City Initiative (Windsor Healthy City) was launched in June 2020. The Initiative’s focus is to engage community leaders, politicians and residents in ongoing public debate and collective action to ensure that the City of Windsor emerges from the pandemic as a Healthy City, from equity, public health and sustainability perspectives.

Background

The World Health Organization (WHO) defines a Healthy City as one that is “continually creating and improving those physical and social environments and expanding those community resources which enable people to mutually support each other in performing all the functions of life and developing to their maximum potential.”

In the COVID era, there have been countless calls for cities to take the lead in focussing on a pandemic recovery that is equitable, healthy and sustainable. Recent “just recovery” movements have similar goals. The Black Lives Matter movement and anti-Black racism responses, coupled with ongoing obligations on all levels of government to respond to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission with respect to Canada’s Indigenous peoples, have shone an even more intense light on the obligations of cities to ensure that the recovery is a recovery for all. And climate change is no less of an urgent and existential crisis than it was before COVID began. In Windsor, these challenges are heightened by an underlying economic crisis.

Events

On 26 June 2020 the Windsor Law Centre for Cities hosted its first Healthy Cities event: “Windsor and the Post-Pandemic Healthy City: A Community Conversation”. Read more about this event here. A video recording of the full event is available here, and individual (4 minute) video presentations are available on the Windsor Law Centre for Cities YouTube channel or below (new videos added daily).

Elayne Isaacs (Southwest Ontario Aboriginal Health Access Centre)

View Ms. Isaacs’ video here.

Dr. Laverne Jacobs (UWindsor Law/Law, Disability & Social Change Project)

View Dr. Jacobs’ video here.

Janice Kaffer (Hôtel-Dieu Grace Healthcare)

View Ms. Kaffer’s video here.

Hugo Vega (YMCA of Southwestern Ontario)

View Mr. Hugo’s video here.

Imam Yousef Wahb (Windsor Islamic Association)

View Imam Yousef’s video here.

Jeremiah Bowers (National Black Students’ Caucus)

View Mr. Bowers’ video here.

Dr. Vincent Georgie (UWindsor SoCA/Windsor International Film Festival)

View Dr. Georgie’s video here.

Judene McCalla (See You There Invitations)

View Ms. McCalla’s video here.

Lyra Sheldon (Student, École Sécondaire Catholique E.J. Lajeunesse)

View Ms. Sheldon’s video here.

Dr. Edwin Tam (University of Windsor, Faculty of Engineering)

View Dr. Tam’s video here.

Bryan Datoc (Craft Heads Brewing Co.)

View Mr. Datoc’s video here.

Dr. Sarah Woodruff Atkinson (University of Windsor, Faculty of Human Kinetics/Community Health, Environment and Wellness Lab)

View Dr. Woodruff Atkinson’s video here.

Deidre Ritsche (Border City Living)

View Ms. Ritsche’s video here.

Community partners

Thank you to our community partners who share an interest in pursuing Healthy City principles in the City of Windsor:

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