Archived - Urban Aboriginal Strategy

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Name of lead department(s): Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada (AANDC)

Lead department program: Under AANDC's program alignment architecture, Urban Aboriginal Strategy is categorized under the Strategic Outcome entitled "The Land and Economy." The Program for the Initiative is entitled Urban Aboriginal Participation.

Start date of the Horizontal Initiative: April 1, 2007

End date of the Horizontal Initiative: Ongoing

Total federal funding allocation (start to end date):

From 2007–2012: $68.5 million
As of 2012: $13.5 million annually

Description of the Horizontal Initiative (including funding agreement):

The Urban Aboriginal Strategy (UAS) was developed in 1997 to respond to the needs of Aboriginal people living in key urban centres. Through the UAS, the Government of Canada provides flexible seed funding and seeks to partner with other levels of government, Aboriginal and community organizations, and the private sector to support initiatives that increase the economic participation of Aboriginal people living in urban centres.

In 2012, the Government of Canada extended the UAS and transferred three urban Aboriginal programs from Canadian Heritage to AANDC:

Aboriginal Friendship Centres Program
Cultural Connections for Aboriginal Youth
Young Canada Works for Aboriginal Urban Youth

The transfer of these programs allows for greater focus and coordination of federal efforts to help urban and off-reserve Aboriginal people increase their participation in the Canadian economy.

Shared outcome(s):

The primary goal of the UAS is to better address issues facing Aboriginal people living in cities across Canada. The strategy seeks to achieve the following outcomes:

Urban Aboriginal socio-economic needs are targeted within new and renewed federal initiatives, where appropriate.
Access to and coordination of programs and services is improved.
Partners coordinate development and communication of research, policies and knowledge.
Horizontal linkages and policy integration within the federal government are improved, leading to better opportunities for partnership (e.g., the federal government, provincial and municipal governments, Aboriginal groups, and private sector).

To accomplish these outcomes, UAS projects will focus investments in three priority areas:

improving life skills;
promoting job training, skills and entrepreneurship; and
supporting Aboriginal women, children and families.

Governance structure(s):

Steering committees are the catalysts for planning, making funding decisions and coordinating work through the UAS — along with other community activities — to respond to urban Aboriginal issues. Each UAS steering committee comprises a cross-section of the Aboriginal community to ensure the steering committee's decisions reflect broad community concerns and priorities. While the steering committee structure is meant to reflect local circumstances, each steering committee includes representation from the local Aboriginal community, the federal government, other levels of government and the private sector. The inclusive nature of the steering committees is indicative of the principle of partnership that underlies the UAS, particularly in keeping with the objective to establish strong and active partnerships between government and community.

Regardless of whether funding is delivered by a community organization, federal officials or a combination of the two, funding through the UAS is designed to promote co-operation with other key partners (including other federal departments) and stakeholders in support of community interests.

Planning Highlights:

The UAS works in partnership with other federal departments, provincial and municipal governments, Aboriginal communities and the private sector to make strategic investments designed to enhance the economic and social participation of Aboriginal people in Canada's urban centres. Community projects funded through the UAS focus on three priority areas:

improving life skills;
promoting job training, skills and entrepreneurship; and
supporting Aboriginal women, children and families.

The UAS also invests in building capacity within the urban Aboriginal community through investments that help form effective partnerships and develop and implement strategic plans that address the unique needs of each community.

The UAS will work on achieving greater horizontality across federal departments to maximize investments. It will explore and implement new and innovative approaches to increase horizontality.

The UAS will also work toward its core objectives, including closing the socio-economic gaps between urban Aboriginal people and other city residents and helping urban Aboriginal people increase their participation in the economy. It will realize these goals by leveraging funding from other levels of government and the private sector and by better aligning federal initiatives with provincial-municipal initiatives and other activities to better support.

The UAS is an opportunity-driven strategy designed to leverage other federal, provincial, municipal and private funding for community-based projects rather than funding pre-planned projects. For these reasons, variances will exist between the planned spending and partnering, and actual spending and partnering when the UAS reports on its results at the end of 2014-2015.

Federal Partners: Canadian Heritage, Public Safety Canada, Employment and Social Development Canada, Public Health Agency of Canada, Department of Justice

**Federal Partner:** Aboriginal Affairs and Northern Development Canada
Federal Partner Program	Names of programs funded under the horizontal initiative	($ millions)
Federal Partner Program	Names of programs funded under the horizontal initiative	Total Allocation (from Start to End Date)	Planned Spending for 2014–2015
Urban Aboriginal Participation	Urban Aboriginal Strategy		13,500,000
Total			13,500,000