The Peel Youth Charter was created in October of 2007. Eleven signatories unanimously adopted the Charter on behalf of civic and policing partners. In 2018, the Peel Poverty Action Group advocated for a re-endorsement of the Charter, with greater youth involvement. Mississauga Ward 9 Councillor Martin Reid says that he wants to revisit and update it based on the changing needs of the community.
Q: How far along are you in the process?
A: Really, really early. I’ve started to kind of plant that seed with people, and other people are starting to ask the same questions. We just approved the new Community Safety and Wellbeing Framework at Council and that was done very well. We had the right people at the table through the process. Now we can look at how we’re going to engage the charter of that document. Everyone has all these strategy documents, so I want to bring them all together to form this new charter.
Q: The original Youth Charter didn’t have much input from actual youth. Will it be different this time?
A: Definitely. Part of it will be having the voice of youth at the table. The other part of it will be the agencies, the people who are trying to guide the youth into their potential. We sometimes get criticism for not having youth at the table, but we have the people who serve them. Both voices need to be heard.
Q: What’s being done to prevent having one person from a group asked to speak on behalf of their entire community?
A: Building a bigger table. That’s really it, and not gatekeep who can be there. People come to council, or see me in the street or at events, and say that people weren’t heard. There’s a part of me that’s upset because I know those voices were represented but we didn’t do a good job telling the story of who was there. So people assume it’s been business as usual when that wasn’t the case this time around.
Q: There’s an election in just over a year. Is this as a post or pre-election goal?
A: I want to do it as soon as possible, but as thoroughly as possible. If it rolls into the next term of office, I’m okay with that, because I want the document to outlive me. This is my pet project, and this isn’t something that I want to make an empty campaign promise with. I want it to be something embedded in how we work and is informing how we do things in the recent eld, and that has to live longer than me. So it really isn’t a campaign-based thing. Just like, start it when it’s ready and do it right.
Q: Why do we need the Youth Charter?
A: We need to have some common language. We need to have a common marching order to be able to do this work, because otherwise, people work in silos, and get burnt out