British Columbia is a large and complicated province and because of the differences in topography and settlement, it can best be analyzed on a regional basis. This study of social welfare measurements in Metropolitan Vancouver, is the third in a series of regional assessments. The two regions so far examined are the agricultural area of the Fraser Valley, and one of the "Frontier" areas of the North. The Metropolis, obviously, has very different characteristics from both of them and is the most complex region of all. It has been undergoing a period of rapid population growth, and the development of suburban communities. At the present time, approximately one-half of the population of British Columbia lives in Metropolitan Vancouver. Metropolitan Vancouver is included in Region II of the Department of Social Welfare. However, some areas of Region II such as Powell River, which are not in the metropolitan context have been largely excluded from this analysis. Other areas, such as the Municipality of Surrey and the City of White Rock, have been included as they are populated by those for whom the urban centre has a large measure of social and economic significance. This "Region" of Metropolitan Vancouver coincides with sub-divisions C and D of Census Division 4, and thus obviates one of the major difficulties in undertaking a regional study: that census material boundaries and welfare regional boundaries do not coincide. Basic statistical data was compiled and computed from the Dominion Bureau of Statistics. Extensive use was made of 1961 data, and selective reference was made to 1951 data. Information was available for Metropolitan Vancouver in the detailed Census Tract Bulletin now prepared by the Dominion Bureau of Statistics for all major cities. To simplify analysis, these tracts have been summarized into "sectors". A series of indices was also worked out to reflect social and economic conditions which may have welfare implications. The welfare statistics were compiled primarily from the monthly reports of the Provincial Department of Social Welfare, for the years 1951 and 1961. However, in Metropolitan Vancouver there are also numerous private social agencies and a few major ones serving the family, and children have been chosen to examine more fully, the welfare services. Correlation of social and economic factors with the welfare pattern in the metropolitan area has been undertaken. "Sector" analysis, initiated in this study, has revealed differential welfare requirements. All districts use welfare services: the most prosperous, in which there are marginal income enclaves; and others, demonstrating the complex of social problems inherent in unplanned urban expansion. Difficulties encountered in this regional study highlight the need for standardization of Welfare Region and Census Division boundaries. Most essential for productive analysis of welfare statistics is the formulation of standard, operationally-defined categories of service for both public and private agencies; one critical distinction might be made between income-maintenance programmes and personal services. This is an initial exploratory study of Metropolitan Vancouver as a "Welfare Region". Even as this report is prepared the characteristics of the metropolitan area are changing. With one-half of the provincial population living in this "Region" further studies will be needed to provide adequate information for comprehensive, enduring planning for the welfare needs of the people who live in Metropolitan Vancouver. / Arts, Faculty of / Social Work, School of / Graduate

This Thesis was prompted by the belief that most town planners in their creation of the physical environment generally do not realize that they are also creating a social environment. This is particularly true of the sub-division design aspect of planning. In order to show that the local physical environment as created by subdivision design does affect local relationships, a planned veterans' housing project in East Vancouver was studied. The underlying reason for choosing the veterans' project, Renfrew Heights, was because the tenants were quite a homogeneous group as a result of the entry requirements of the Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation. This being the case, the effects of the design itself could be more easily determined. It was believed that people in the lower socio-economic groups were more affected by environment than those in the higher socioeconomic groups. Allied with this thought was the belief that the community of interest in areas like Renfrew was often the community itself. Because of these beliefs and the homogeneity of the community, the Renfrew project was chosen. The basic thesis of the study was similar to Robert E. Parks' definition of human ecology - that man's relationships with man are affected by environment. It was proposed that at the neighbourhood level local friendships were affected by four basic physical factors. It was proposed that these four physical factors were; (1) distance between houses; (2) differences in elevation or vertical distance; (3) the use that the distance is put to, or intensity of use; (4) orientation of houses or the way they face. A questionnaire was prepared and housewives were interviewed personally in order to determine what the local friendship pattern was in various parts of the project. An analysis of the questionnaire showed that local friendships were affected by the four physical factors. The need for further social research is stressed, particularly the social aspects of planning, in order to see if we are really planning for the people. It is concluded that it is upon this area of study that the future of town planning depends. / Applied Science, Faculty of / Community and Regional Planning (SCARP), School of / Graduate

This thesis addresses the subject of organizational effectiveness in municipal governance. It specifically examines the possibility that urban planning agencies may resolve complex social problems more effectively when using a management approach characterized by "transformational leadership," teamwork, flexibility, and creativity; an approach that fosters the development of innovative planning policies, procedures and/or designs. Successful, innovative, and creative business enterprises that endorse such a holistic management approach have been called "learning" and "well-performing" organizations. The management and transformational leadership attributes that encourage an organization to "learn" relies on a combination of techniques, including non-hierarchical communications, enhancement of job satisfaction, continuous learning, emotive and motivational psychology, and team approaches to creativity and problem solving. A popular term has been coined that captures the essence of successful implementation of these attributes in combination: Excellence. The rationale for examining the concept of Excellence in the context of urban planning agencies' organizational effectiveness derives from assertions made in the planning and governance literature suggesting that such a business management approach may significantly improve government operations. Some writers argue that a new approach to governance is sorely needed. The concept of encouraging attributes of Excellence in local government planning practices has been extolled as a cure for economic and political inequalities, restricted avenues of communication, outmoded operating procedures, "turf wars, and various motivational barriers to innovative practices that limit the effectiveness of governments (and urban planners). Many of the innovative practices lauded in the business management literature as attributes of Excellence appear similar to the community development concepts of individual empowerment, citizen participation in local planning and decision making, collective effort to resolve local issues, consensus building, and visionary leadership. This thesis studies the case of the City of Vancouver's Department of Social Planning and Community Development from 1968 to 1976. The two primary research methods used are: analysis of archival documents concerning Vancouver's social planning department; and, open ended interviews conducted with sixteen key informants familiar with the history, practices, and planning approaches used by department personnel during the study period. The findings of this thesis are that: 1) the social planning department originally exhibited elements of innovation, flexibility, teamwork, transformational leadership, and other attributes associated with the concept of Excellence; 2) in some cases, these attributes may have temporarily overcome various barriers to effective planning and problem solving by developing innovative solutions to minor urban social problems; 3) those innovative elements were not unanimously supported nor encouraged in other municipal departments or community agencies, thus indicating that diffuse innovative practices throughout other organizations was a difficult endeavor; 4) over time, attributes of Excellence faded from the social planning department as the early excitement and energy of planners wore off and new planners were hired to replace the original social planners who had decided to move on to other projects. The important lesson learned is that these supposedly "new" management practices, introduced into business enterprises to help overcome barriers to productivity, efficiency, or effectiveness, are themselves vulnerable to similar organizational, political, or behavioral barriers over time. Constant vigilance, monitoring and evaluation of values, goals, communications strategies and structures, and organizational results are required to sustain Excellence. Greater promotion of Excellence concepts that explain business success may legitimize the expansion of participation of individuals in goverment institutions and result in improvements to their effectiveness. Urban planners, and social planners in particular, should therefore be interested in concepts like Excellence and Learning Organizations as heuristic usable in their search for effective planning, organizing, and management practices toward intentional interventions in social welfare. Without a systematic approach and understanding of the complex variables and dimensions involved, concepts like Excellence may be treated simply as catch-words and trendy marketing ploys. However, as the thesis will show, planners may discover that further research into the qualities and attributes of individuals working in a collective organizational environment, may yield positive strategies for furthering institutional reforms that view workers as factors of human development rather than as units of productivity and efficiency.

This thesis addresses the subject of organizational effectiveness in municipal governance. It specifically examines the possibility that urban planning agencies may resolve complex social problems more effectively when using a management approach characterized by "transformational leadership," teamwork, flexibility, and creativity; an approach that fosters the development of innovative planning policies, procedures and/or designs. Successful, innovative, and creative business enterprises that endorse such a holistic management approach have been called "learning" and "well-performing" organizations. The management and transformational leadership attributes that encourage an organization to "learn" relies on a combination of techniques, including non-hierarchical communications, enhancement of job satisfaction, continuous learning, emotive and motivational psychology, and team approaches to creativity and problem solving. A popular term has been coined that captures the essence of successful implementation of these attributes in combination: Excellence. The rationale for examining the concept of Excellence in the context of urban planning agencies' organizational effectiveness derives from assertions made in the planning and governance literature suggesting that such a business management approach may significantly improve government operations. Some writers argue that a new approach to governance is sorely needed. The concept of encouraging attributes of Excellence in local government planning practices has been extolled as a cure for economic and political inequalities, restricted avenues of communication, outmoded operating procedures, "turf wars, and various motivational barriers to innovative practices that limit the effectiveness of governments (and urban planners). Many of the innovative practices lauded in the business management literature as attributes of Excellence appear similar to the community development concepts of individual empowerment, citizen participation in local planning and decision making, collective effort to resolve local issues, consensus building, and visionary leadership. This thesis studies the case of the City of Vancouver's Department of Social Planning and Community Development from 1968 to 1976. The two primary research methods used are: analysis of archival documents concerning Vancouver's social planning department; and, open ended interviews conducted with sixteen key informants familiar with the history, practices, and planning approaches used by department personnel during the study period. The findings of this thesis are that: 1) the social planning department originally exhibited elements of innovation, flexibility, teamwork, transformational leadership, and other attributes associated with the concept of Excellence; 2) in some cases, these attributes may have temporarily overcome various barriers to effective planning and problem solving by developing innovative solutions to minor urban social problems; 3) those innovative elements were not unanimously supported nor encouraged in other municipal departments or community agencies, thus indicating that diffuse innovative practices throughout other organizations was a difficult endeavor; 4) over time, attributes of Excellence faded from the social planning department as the early excitement and energy of planners wore off and new planners were hired to replace the original social planners who had decided to move on to other projects. The important lesson learned is that these supposedly "new" management practices, introduced into business enterprises to help overcome barriers to productivity, efficiency, or effectiveness, are themselves vulnerable to similar organizational, political, or behavioral barriers over time. Constant vigilance, monitoring and evaluation of values, goals, communications strategies and structures, and organizational results are required to sustain Excellence. Greater promotion of Excellence concepts that explain business success may legitimize the expansion of participation of individuals in goverment institutions and result in improvements to their effectiveness. Urban planners, and social planners in particular, should therefore be interested in concepts like Excellence and Learning Organizations as heuristic usable in their search for effective planning, organizing, and management practices toward intentional interventions in social welfare. Without a systematic approach and understanding of the complex variables and dimensions involved, concepts like Excellence may be treated simply as catch-words and trendy marketing ploys. However, as the thesis will show, planners may discover that further research into the qualities and attributes of individuals working in a collective organizational environment, may yield positive strategies for furthering institutional reforms that view workers as factors of human development rather than as units of productivity and efficiency. / Applied Science, Faculty of / Community and Regional Planning (SCARP), School of / Graduate

This study is an initial and exploratory venture toward examining organizational change as it applies to the field of social welfare in Greater Vancouver. Specifically the formulation for documenting change as outlined in the proposal of the Area Development Project of the Greater Vancouver Area was used in three separate case studies. The study has concerned itself with documenting the process of organizational change (both planned and unplanned), rather than analyzing the effect organizational change has had upon services and/or agencies. The first case study deals with three social actions initiated in 1964 by the Society of Women Only, a group of deserted women in the Vancouver Area. In each action process the organization was attempting to create change in governmental systems of a mutual support and social control nature. The change processes were documented from their inception but not to their conclusions. The structured organizational change documented in the second case study occurred in 1961. At that time two divisions of the Social Planning Section of the Community Chest and Councils of Greater Vancouver, the Groupwork and Recreation Division and the Family and Child Welfare Division were combined. The combined divisions became the Welfare and Recreation Council. The whole change process was documented from its inception in 1960 until the change was assessed by a special committee in January - March 1965. The third case study considers the documentation of organizational change being attempted in a geographic area known as Sunrise Park in the city of Vancouver. The purpose of this change process has been to formulate plans for action by the health, recreation, education and welfare agencies towards solving problems that exist or may exist as a result of the introduction of a large public housing project into the area. The case study deals with change process in its initial stages as the organizational change in the period under study was only just beginning. Each writer has concluded his case study by making a number of critical observations concerning the utility of the selected model for the development of both theory and practice in the field of community organization. / Arts, Faculty of / Social Work, School of / Myers, Robert James; Belknap, John Victor / Graduate

No description available.

No description available.

Community organization as a basic social work method has taken on increasing emphasis during the past decade. There is a growing awareness of the contribution this method has to make in a variety of settings in social welfare and allied fields. This year, the School of Social Work, University of British Columbia, initiated courses and field work placements in this specialization for students in their second year of professional training. Partly because of the absence of this type of training in the past, there has been a dearth of studies of Vancouver neighbourhoods from a community organization point of view. Opportunity was provided through student placements to examine four disparate, dynamic and changing communities. The scarcity of previous studies denied access to any defined rationale. The examinations were based upon the tentative assumption that there should be a significant involvement of both physical and social planning at all stages of neighbourhood development. For the present studies, a variety of methods for obtaining information was employed. Primary among these were:- interviewing of key individuals in the communities and of representatives of agencies, institutions and associations knowledgable about the communities; an examination of pertinent agency records; attendance at a variety of meetings of local import; obtaining demographic statistical information. The findings of the West End study reveal it to be an area undergoing rapid change. The failure to establish decisive physical planning for the area creates uncertainty among local leaders otherwise well equipped to engage in social planning. A new community is thus evolving in haphazard response to this fact. Problems related to the behaviour of young people have given Fraserview, a veterans' housing area, a degree of notoriety which is not altogether deserved. Although the present density of teenagers was predictable seven years ago, the social planning process, at the agency as well as at the Community Chest and Councils level, was unable to marshall community resources to meet adequately the specific needs of this area. The mobilization of the professionals and their subsequent incorporation as the Fraserview Youth Services Society is designed to provide the needed local planning body. Skeena Terrace Public Housing is a major low-rental housing project located in an officially undefined community. Tenants have come from many parts of the city, but none from the area adjacent to the housing project. The findings indicate a degree of neighbourhood feeling developing on the project but little integration with the community of Sunrise Park. Strathcona, a severely blighted area, is presently undergoing planned physical redevelopment on a comprehensive scale. Results of this study which has been conducted in the very early stages of the changing environmental conditions indicate a need for extensive preplanning on the part of the governments, private agencies, and citizenry. Co-Ordination of all concerned is required so that satisfactory social arrangements for this community can be effected and thus ease the problems of relocation and redevelopment. These studies are of an exploratory nature - a deliberate effort to look at the communities without initial preconceptions. Although a few neighbourhood studies in Vancouver have been undertaken by students from this School, the value of this thesis may well stem from its community organization focus which could complement and supplement those with a case work and group work emphasis. These pilot projects may give rise to further analyses of Vancouver neighbourhoods and thus contribute to more comprehensive understanding of changing neighbourhoods within the city. / Arts, Faculty of / Social Work, School of / Graduate

This is a study of the social adaptation of native Indian people in the city of Vancouver, British Columbia and the methodological implications for future research in this area. It was accomplished by reviewing the roots of the problem in history, exploring the reserve system, defining the problem as it now exists in Vancouver and outlining some programmes designed to facilitate this adaptation (in particular the Vancouver Indian Centre). In addition, it is an interview survey of the opinions of Indians and experts in Indian Affairs with respect to their perception of Indian problems and their suggestions for solution. The significance of this study is twofold. First of all, it illustrates that agencies which sponsor research may have a tendency to see its value only in pragmatic returns rather than in the contributions such research may make to generally improved understanding as a basis for sound planning. Secondly, it adds to our fund of knowledge of the urban Indian population and indicates possible future areas of research. The method consisted of highly unstructured interviews with the persons noted above. Whereas the content of the interviews with experts related primarily to the need for research, the areas of possible research, and the suggested solutions, those with Indian people focussed on specific topics such as reserves, types of schools, use of the native language, integration and amalgamation. It was suggested by officials and persons who have a great deal of contact with Indians that these were topics to which the Indian was particularly sensitive and that they were therefore not appropriate content for exploration after limited contact with subjects. We concluded that this is not necessarily true. These limited contacts with Indians who have come to the city also indicated that Indians are forsaking the reserves to seek opportunity and improved status in the urban community. In the process they are making valiant efforts to adjust to the white culture. This presupposes native strengths which should be recognized as a positive basis upon which to build welfare services. Because of the exploratory nature of this study, many of these strengths will have to be more positively identified, verified and correlated by future research. The main conclusion is that action-research in several specific areas would meet the needs and expectations of the Indians, the experts in Indian Affairs and the urban-White population. / Arts, Faculty of / Social Work, School of / Graduate

The development of the Automated Light Rapid Transit (ALRT) system in Vancouver, first proposed in the 1970's, has been touted as a solution to the contemporary urban problems of increasing traffic congestion, access to the downtown core, and limited affordable housing near the city centre. Recent concerns have been expressed that the development of the ALRT will be accompanied by significant change in the neighbourhoods along the route. This thesis aims to assess the potential for significant change occurring in the suburban Vancouver City neighbourhoods along the ALRT route after the construction is completed. The increased accessibility to the city centre anticipated as an outcome of the development of the ALRT is regarded as the factor most likely to produce significant change in neighbourhoods along the route. This expectation arises from the understanding provided by literature from the fields of urban economics and urban ecology. Discussions of the bid-price curve in the work of Alonso and other urban economic writers attributes much of the market value of land, and by inference the residential density of land, to the effect of accessibility to the city centre. Further discussions in the urban ecology literature, including the work of the factorial ecology school, outline the relationship between accessibility to the city centre and the distribution in urban areas of social rank and of household types. From the relationships indicated in the literature, it is expected that the improved accessibility which will result from the construction of the ALRT could significantly change neighbourhoods along the route. Using Census data, the thesis explores the strength of the existing relationships between accessibility to the city centre and each of the social characteristics identified in the literature. The strength of each relationship was determined using a rank-order correlation between relative accessibility to the city centre and z-scores associated with indicators for each of the social characteristics. The relationship between accessibility to the city centre and social rank was examined using the highest level of education attained by the over 15 year old population as a proxy for social rank. The proportions of the various household types, including family and non-family households, single-person and multiple-person non-family households, were used to provide insights into variations in this aspect of urban life which is affected by accessibility to the city centre. Finally, the relationship between accessibility to the city centre and the distribution of dwelling types was examined by looking at variations in the distributions of single-detached, multiple-dwelling, and apartment units along the ALRT route. Social rank was found to be not strongly correlated with the level of accessibility to the city centre. Instead, the distribution of social rank was seen to have been more strongly influenced by other factors, such as the historic pattern of development. The distribution of dwelling types and of the various household types were demonstrated to be related to accessibility to the city centre. As the level of accessibility to the city centre increased, the proportion of apartment units in an area and the proportion of non-family households were seen to increase. The development of the ALRT was not expected to significantly affect the distribution of social rank along the route. Expectations that significant change would follow the development of the ALRT was supported for both the spatial pattern of the various dwelling types and the spatial pattern of the household types. The spatial distribution of both of these social indicators would be expected to change significantly following the completion of the ALRT. / Applied Science, Faculty of / Community and Regional Planning (SCARP), School of / Graduate