Prosper Canada's commitment to Black Canadians

To support the flourishing of Black households and communities in Canada, and to help address systemic and institutional discrimination that limit their income, wealth, and economic opportunities, Prosper Canada is announcing a new five-year commitment to supporting the financial empowerment of Black Canadians.
 
Prosper Canada is a national charity dedicated to expanding economic opportunity for Canadians living in poverty through program and policy innovation.  As Canada’s leading national champion of financial empowerment, we work with government, business, and community partners to develop and promote policies, programs and resources that transform lives and build the prosperity of all Canadians.  We have always understood, though, that some populations face additional barriers and that, to be effective, frontline services need to work in close partnership with these populations to ensure their efforts are inclusive of them and to co-develop tailored approaches to meet their needs. 
 
Black staff and community financial empowerment leaders have helped us to identify the potential impact we can make by supporting financial empowerment for Black Canadians and conversations with funders have identified a number who want to support this work.
 
To be effective, we recognize that we must partner with and support Black-led, Black-serving, and Black-focused organizations to develop and promote policies, programs and resources that are rooted in and address the perspectives, experiences, and priorities of Black Canadians. We also need to encourage and support frontline financial empowerment organizations, in turn, to engage with Black organizations and communities and to co-create with them tailored approaches to meeting Black community financial empowerment needs.
 
Promoting financial inclusion and equity for Black Canadians, as well as  combatting anti-Black racism, will take sustained commitment and effort and cannot be dependent on short-term project cycles. For this reason, our commitment will be for at least five years and include dedicated annual staff capacity and program resources that are not contingent on project funding.  We will also have a transparent process for renewing or ending this commitment after five years.
 
Priority actions
 
To realize our commitment to Black Canadians, we are undertaking the following priority actions:
 

• Developing a multi-year action plan and publicly reporting on our progress to keep us accountable and transparent in our endeavors.

• Building competence in our organization and our national network to see and combat anti-Black racism in Canada – learning how racial discrimination and bias can manifest in our organizations and our financial empowerment work with Black Canadians and communities, and pursuing true inclusion and allyship in both these contexts. Prosper Canada’s position in the broader financial empowerment ecosystem allows us to create opportunities for our partners, as well as our own organization, to gain and apply this learning. 

• Building deeper, more sustained, and trusted relationships between Prosper Canada and Black-led, Black-serving, and Black-focused organizations that align with their financial wellness priorities and needs and encouraging and supporting frontline financial empowerment organizations in our network to do the same.

• Developing processes to ensure the services, training, tools and resources that Prosper Canada develops are inclusive of Black Canadians and, where appropriate, directly tailored to their needs; and sharing insights and practices though our network to encourage and support other financial empowerment organizations to go on a similar journey.

• Ensuring the National Financial Empowerment Network that we animate welcomes, and is inclusive of, Black-led, Black-serving, and Black-focused organizations and that its offerings are relevant to their needs.  

We are early in this journey and have much to learn but believe the important thing is to commit, begin, and to embrace progress over perfection. 
 
We are indebted to the Black staff and community leaders who have inspired us to take this first step and look forward to expanding our partnerships with Black organizations and building our capacity and that of frontline financial empowerment organizations to remove barriers and support the financial empowerment goals of Black Canadians and communities.