Episode 3: Steph Stretch

Adam Creswell 0:23 Hey everyone, welcome back. My name is Adam Creswell and this is Winter is Coming podcast about housing justice in Kitchener, Waterloo and beyond. And of course we say Kitchener Waterloo because many of us are familiar with it on our Google Maps and Apple Maps and things like that. But this is a territory of the Haudenosaunee,  Anishinaabe and Neutral Peoples stewarded for many, many thousands of years by indigenous peoples. We are talking this week again about housing justice and what that means and what that looks like in our communities and beyond. This podcast was sprung from the Trinity United Church Affordable Housing Committee, who have made it their primary mission at Trinity to support housing justice and affordable housing at their church and the Hub Community Network, which is a group of youth and young adult summer camp folks who love to get together during the year and talk about the liberating love of Christ. And so that's a little bit of background about where we come from. But this podcast is for anybody listening who is interested in how we can make strides forward in terms of a more just.   Community neighborhoods and system of housing in those communities. And this week we are talking with Steph Stretch, who is running for council currently for council in Ward Ten in Kitchener Waterloo and Steph is my bias has been someone I've known and respected for a long, long time and has worked in the camp community that I've worked at and has been an incredible I will say the word community activist. And in some ways I really just mean community member who is active. Sometimes these terms like activist can make it feel like it's some professional thing that you need training and you go to school for. And really, Steph and her family have just been incredibly caring neighbors and incredibly   active people in the community, both in terms of how they go about their lives and their neighborhoods and I know even how they go about looking to make a more just world for housing, including for neighbors, for friends, for newcomers into Canada and Ontario. And so I am super pumped, Step, that you are running again for council, and I'm super pumped that you fit into a very busy schedule as we were chatting before we hit the record button, a very busy schedule of events and meetings and emails and door knocking. We're recording like two weeks, two to three weeks before the election. And so very grateful for you to sit down and chat with us today. So thanks for being here. 

Steph   3:27  Thanks, Adam. That was so nice. It's nice to hear repeated back. Yeah, thanks. Yeah.  

Adam 3:34  And we are chatting with different people from so we're trying to get different lenses and angles on this conversation around housing justice. We've chatted with Laura Mae Lindo who's the Kitchener Center NDP MPP at the provincial level, we've chatted with Mike Morris who is at the federal or A level. And so I'm really excited to be able to also chat about what this looks like at a municipal level. Because one thing we chatted about in both conversations, both of those conversations was that sometimes our attention, because it's more high profile, can be pulled to   federal politics and provincial politics or even just even if we're not political   interested people, just the high profile nature of those campaigns can pull our attention. But so much of positive change and so much of what really impacts us and our neighbors happens at the municipal level. And it's really easy for us because they're not as high profile and because we're coming off a year where a 13 month stretch where we've had a federal election here in Canada, we've had a provincial election. And so I do understand there can be kind of a burnout sense, but especially when it comes to housing, so much of these solutions are going to really come down to what happens at a municipal level. So it's really great to have somebody who is running for council at the municipal level here to chat today about what that looks like both in your life and your experience and in your work and your pursuit of a council seat.   So I guess kind of my first question that I often ask is what was your first introduction step to affordable housing or housing justice? How did it first kind of come to your attention? Maybe before probably before even your campaigning days? 

Steph  5:31   Yes way before my campaigning days. So my first introduction into the unjust ways our society works, one of my very first memories actually was… so I'm born and raised in Kitchener, we lived just down Krug Street, kind of in the suburb, very close to downtown, but we never went downtown. We had cars, we drove everywhere and we went into Toronto. We were going to Toronto Island for the day. We were down by the ferry and I don't know how old I was, maybe   eight or so.   And we're getting on the ferry and we saw a homeless person and I mean a very stereotypically looking homeless person.   And I remember they were asking for loonies and loonies were kind of new at the time, however old I was.  I was with my dad and I remember holding my dad's hand and going like, dad, this guy needs some help. Give him your loonies. And saying like, dad, we should help him, we should take him home. I know I was thinking through like, we only have one bathroom, but it's going to be awkward to share it with him, but we've need to help. And my dad politely giving a loonie and kind of tapping me on the head like, come on, let's go. And just being like, that's what we're doing, that's what you do.   And talking about that with my dad a little bit after and him being empathetic, but also kind of like stuff we can't help. He can't come home with us. We know nothing about him.   So I remember my very first reaction to some of the injustices that face us.   And I probably did didn't have to go that far to Toronto, but that's my first memory.  

Adam 7:31  It's actually kind of interesting that my first memory is almost identical in the sense that I was a little kid and my dad worked at the Royal Ontario Museum and had a similar situation.  I also grew up in Kitchener and also didn't really go downtown where a lot of street involved people live and dwell and work. And so I remember going to  work with my dad…. I don't know if it was  a take your Kid to Work day or something, but across from the ROM was  a McDonald's. So it was a great day. Got to go to McDonald's at lunch after a day of being in the ROM. And what was really cool about my dad working there is that I'd get to be in the museum after and before hours. So it was like wild to be able to be in the museum. Pretty much it's just like us and the staff and the security guards, which was very cool. And I remember then going to McDonald's across the street for lunch. Yeah, I would probably be in the same, like seven or eight years and kind of  the first experience seeing someone who is street involved there,  who was asking for change and just being so kind of hit by it in a way that realizing .. the same thing,   how has this happened …? Just thinking like, well, is someone doing anything about this? And so, yeah, interesting that we have very similar kind of stories of those first experiences, those first encounters. Fast forward from being a kid and kind of encountering for the first time. How did it kind of intersect with your life? Maybe in years later,   post kind of childhood when you're starting to sort of form up into maybe it's teenage years or 20 something, when you're starting to be not just the kid who needs dad to be able to get the looney or get, like, the pat on the head, but you're really starting to think about the world and how you want to move in. It. How did it start to intersect with your life later?  

Steph  9:42  So absolutely. I think from there I started building context growing up, even playing at different friends houses, understanding, like, wow, this house is huge.   This is an apartment, like, building context for how this   fits together. I had two working parents, so lots of babysitters and   being spent in other people's homes. And   then I think when it really kind of clicked, all the systems working together and how does this still happen? Yeah, I probably would have been   late 20s when I started really figuring out the systematic problems and how the systems really fail people   and if you are vulnerable in any way in your own personal life,   how you need a system to depend on, you need some structure and you need some services, and they often fail. And so I think   I worked throughout university. I volunteered. It was called out of the cold. And then it was Porch Light (or something like that), downtown Guelph. So I volunteered there and … I just really got to know people and their stories [and it] became really real. So there was a professor who had worked at the University of Guelph for a long time and then struggled with some mental health issues and now is living close to the streets.   There were so many stories of people who I would have never thought their story started out so far away from living on the streets and learning about how they got there and the struggles that they're dealing with. So again, sort of realizing that this isn't someone else's problem, this isn't that individual's problem, that this has happened, it's a failing on our community spot. You had   people   find this close to being someone who is on the street because of the complex circumstances that everyone deals with. I think, yeah, I was probably in university when I really made that connection. And then it was something I couldn't leave alone. So my partner, Nathan, he started working at homeless shelters in Toronto and Hamilton, and we started really kind of  digging into our relationships with people and then really trying to figure out, how can we help.  

Adam 12:39     One of the words that I picked up on there, and has come up in other conversations, is this word relationships and this idea about relationships. And one of the things that I talk about in these episodes is I'm not coming at this (even though I'm sitting in kind of the quote unquote host chair) as an expert or someone who works in this field. I would consider myself just a community member, an everyday person who's not an expert, but who recognizes that there's a problem that I want to know more about, and then I also want to be able to do stuff about. And I think it's easy for those of us who sit in that kind of place. And I would probably think … a lot of the people listening are in that place, to kind of start and stop with reading an article or listening to a podcast like this,  or hopefully how we cast our vote or where we can donate some money. And those are all great things to do. But this idea of relationships being such a transformational piece to how we actually  move towards housing justice, forming relationships has come up in these conversations. So can you share a little bit about how relationships has impacted or altered how you've been informed about this topic and also what you've done? You've talked about the Guelph professor, obviously, who is a friend or an acquaintance who, you know. How has relationships changed or informed how you respond to housing justice or where we see housing injustice?  

Steph  14:20   Sure. So   choosing to work in the not for profit field and not just short term or for like a transitional job, but to really   spend my time there, I've had the chance to meet a lot of people I probably wouldn't have had the chance to meet. What that has enabled me to do is to build countless relationships with people. So my work with Corizon Family and Community Services and Pathways to Education. The reason Pathways to Education plopped into Kingsdale Community, which is kind of behind Fairview Mall and the Chandler Mowat Community Centre around that area, which is kind of by McLennan Park. Those catchment areas were chosen because their dropout rate was higher than the national average. There was a willingness for the community to   work on that, and the income levels were low. So the correlation between these   layers.   It gets complex. And so   in many of those areas, there's Ontario housing projects, there's affordable housing. So I've worked with countless students and families navigating the systems to try to figure out how they live when there's so many different situations out there. It could be single income, it could be no income, it could be new Canadians just starting out with no community or network or base to really work from. It could be issues of generational poverty where grandparents didn't have much parents. And so students, people are struggling to do a lot with very little. And so with pathways. The idea is to come in with four main resources financial, academic, social and advocacy work and support these students and families towards education or towards achieving their dreams, whatever that might look like. And then in turn, it becoming long term community development. But starting at some of the roots.   As with many things, you have to report on numbers, right, to access funding. But where my passionate work has not been with  reporting numbers, it’s been with the actual people. So the numbers on the page really represent people to me stories. And so   I've been really happy to work with an organization that really focuses on how do we help this case? Not what system do we apply or what procedure do we apply here, but really, how can we help and what can we do, what else can we connect them with? And a lot of that is who   because depending on who you work with, and their perspective and their heart, it really has to do with how effective the work is.  

Adam 17:43  As someone who started   in the volunteering space, as you talked about. And yeah, I remember when I was a kid in the out of the cold program as somebody started in that volunteer space.   Was it daunting at first to go from sort of it's easy to be behind, sort of. The kind of the glass like window and look at the issue from a distance and then was it kind of daunting to get proximity? Especially when we think about, I think what stops and freezes a lot of us, myself included, when you see a problem that can feel overwhelming and like you said, so complex.   In some ways, it's easy to take one route when you feel overwhelmed and just kind of completely back off and then say, well, it's someone else's problem or it's too big to solve. Or, to take one step closer and to, again, kind of work behind the glass window and keep a distance. Was it daunting to kind of   move into what [some] would say into the trenches? Was it daunting to move into spaces where you were in relationships, in ongoing partnerships with people who were experiencing housing insecurity or experiencing street involved lives? Was that kind of a challenging thing   to overcome? Or did it feel like more of easy, natural fit for who you are?    

Steph  19:30  Yeah, I'm a fan of authentic kind of relationship. So, yeah, kind of being behind that glass piece was always really uncomfortable for me. Behind a glass day serving soup. I definitely did that and started there because   that was my kind of like first window. But I was always a little bit uncomfortable with that. So I always just tried to move away from behind the counters as much as I could. I think a little bit of that is just I was socially more comfortable like that. Everyone's going to have to find their own way. Like, we have to remember we are people on this side too, so we can't pretend to be someone else. We have to do it the way we can do it. And different people have different skills.   And so for me,   relationship and people's skills or however you want to say that, is something I lean into and I really like. And so it wasn't a fearful place for me often where some people it is. And that's okay. That is okay.   Absolutely it was.   And some of the stories are heavy and complex and sometimes times that I couldn't help. And I think that's the risk.   But, you know, I've met families who didn't have a front door, meaning they lived inside, but there was no door on the place. I've met   students whose parents really haven't been looking out for them for a long time, and they've been out on their own kind of couch surfing, from friendly people to   living on their own as best they could. And sometimes you can't fix it, but you can help a little bit. And I think for me, that's been helpful to know. Like, I'm not here to solve problems, I'm not here to fix your life, but out of the place of relationship, it can be like, I'm going to help where I can and what I know how. And really, for me, running on council, this is for me, another place, especially through COVID working on the front lines of things. It's been hard. It's been hard for all of us. But I really would like to learn   where we have bigger teeth so where we have   the ability to take bigger bites out of some of these systematic problems. And I'm really hoping to apply kind of my front line relational work to that system. And really, I'm no expert either. Truly, I am no expert,   but I'm willing to get my hands dirty. And I have. And I really want to keep learning and doing the best good work I can at that table.    

Adam  22:24   I find that very encouraging when you talk about the ability to reconcile with not being able to fix every situation or challenge in a story that you encounter.   One of the ways that I'm wired is I am a fixer. So I have to immediately I want to jump in into okay, well, here we could do this or we could do this, or we could do this to whatever a problem that encounters. And so it's a good, healthy   stretching exercise for me to be able to sit and be in relationship   when there isn't an immediate fix that can happen or when I'm just simply not the person to be able to provide the to fix, but to be able to still, like you said, just to still provide   the presence in that relationship, whether it's the listening ear or, like you said, being able to help in ways you can.   For folks who are entering or thinking of entering volunteering spaces, that this is something that they can for me, this is something that I would need to be able to   grow in, is I'm not there to be a fixer, necessarily. I'm not there to solve things,   but to be able to offer what I can. And as you mentioned, you've taken the work from kind of being in a volunteer space to then working in the nonprofit space and now to running for city council in  Kitchener  in Ward Ten.   

How do you see housing justice kind of played out in your future work as a counselor? How do you see that being something that intersects, knowing that as a counselor, you'll be responsible for many different things, not just one topic or area of need? But obviously, this is a big one, and it's been identified by the Region of Waterloo as a big one. And I think all municipal, federal, and provincial parties and politics and governing bodies have a long way to go. We all have a long way to go in improving. But Waterloo Region, it has been encouraging to see the commitment on Waterloo Region to develop an interim housing plan in the interest of developing a housing plan, recognizing that this has become such a huge problem in our neighborhoods. So you are entering, hopefully to that space that is committed to doing something. How do you see housing justice intersecting with your work as a future city councilor?  

Steph  25:07  So   really, housing these kind of systematic issues really falls under the regional. So we have two tiered municipal government here in KW, so this would really fall under a region. It's a regional issue.   And recently the region has shifted the way they're going to respond to this issue, which is good, because on the front lines we have been sounding the alarm on this issue for years and years and years. So this is not it's election season and it's hot topic and we have encampments, we're starting to see things we haven't seen in our community entities. But this is no surprise and it's not a new issue.   So with it being a regional issue, my role in City Council would be somewhat limited in designing some of the systematic approaches and the policy approaches. But there are ways for the city to be at that table and to  influence change. So on a city level, we can definitely help connect the dots between people accessing housing, people who need it, who are on our housing list, to affordable housing units. We can have a bigger role in advocating for developers to work with middle management   companies, maybe like Habitat for Humanity, because right now in new builds (so imagine a new condo going up),  say it's been negotiated, that a certain percentage of those new builds will have to be affordable housing, especially where the province has stated that needs to be, which is around major transit hubs. So I kind of imagine the ION Line right now, anywhere kind of a kilometer away from that line,   the province has said is prime building area, where we'd like to see intensification and we would like to see more affordable housing. So when the city builds and works with developers,  we have to make sure that our communities are getting some of their needs met by the development too, that developers just can't come in and do what they want. But we need to look at careful design, whether that's more access to green space like new build, integrating parks, integrating retail.   Integrating community space. What does that look like?   So with some of those units going to affordable housing right now, it's kind of just the lucky people that walk through when they're up for sale that access those  spaces. And then in turn, in five years, you can go and sell it at I think … at market rate, so you buy for less. And there's no connection between people who need affordable housing, who have been sitting on these lists, accessing any of those new builds, but we're talking like five units per new build. So really, those are little bites around the edges of   how we can work together to solve this. But it matters, and we should be better at it. Another way is money.   So I'd really love to see, especially being in Ward Ten,   there's several encampments across the city, but one of the major ones is at Victoria and Weber, which is in Ward Ten, which is in the city, I can probably throw a baseball there right now, it's not too far.   I'd really love to see the city step up, budget wise and put some of its money towards this issue.   What that does is it shows that it's a priority, that we're paying attention and that we're not being passive. What it also does is it puts pressure on the other levels of governments to follow suit. For us to say, this is a huge issue and this is important to us, look at us. We put our money where our mouth is, your turn.. so it can go up to regional. It makes a stronger case, provincially and as well as federally for accessing funds to really   build into the community in bigger ways, to take bigger bites out of the homelessness and housing problem.   That's what I'm hoping, and if I'm elected, you'll definitely see me advocate for certain percentages of new builds being allocated to affordable housing. I'm going to work in front, at the table and behind the scenes, trying to connect some of those dots.   And, yeah, I'd really like to kind of put as much pressure as we can to keep asking for more support. I don't want to pass the buck. And by putting [up]  some money, like leading the way and putting some money there, you're. It doesn't pass the buck., it challenges the other levels to step up.    

Adam 30:23   Yeah, the encampment on and again, there are multiple encampments across the city, but the encampment on Victoria Street has come up in a few conversations that we've had so far, and particularly in, I think, the start of November, there's going to be decisions happening around that, around the Victoria Street community that's there. What would you like to see in terms of the developments of what takes place there?  

Steph 30:44     So there's several kind of responses. There's   tent city, there's an encampment at Victoria Park. What I'd like to see there is I would like to see people who want to be housed, housed,   and whatever that looks like.   I'm not suggesting we just hand over a bunch of keys to condos,  housing for different needs looks different. So supportive housing… Supportive housing means 24 hours staff  [are] there. It means there's lots of support built in to having a home.   And it's expensive because you're paying staff, you need buildings. And we're working on some of these things,   but the cost of not doing anything far outweighs the cost of putting in some of these supports now and having worked on Frontline, it would be great if we could stop opening emergency shelters. They are hard places to shelter from.   You're basically there for a night. The goal is survival. And Then in the Morning, you get kicked out to go wherever you go,   and then you can come back at night.   There's an emergency shelter at the Five Points, which is the corner of   Frederick, Ellen and Lancaster. There was an old Tim Horton’s there that left and it became an emergency shelter. And I volunteered and worked, ended up working there for a while. And   that's where I learned more about emergency shelters. So things that are there for just a short time period because there's space available, we need to get people out of the cold. Right. Winter is coming. Winter is always coming!  And Learn, like, yeah, our emergency response to stuff is not like,  it is band aid barely. It's like, Stop the gushing of the blood. But it's not a long term solution. I'm thankful that we have organizations that step into this hard space. I know there are people who do it. Absolutely. Let's continue to support them, but let's move away from, like, responding in emergency.   Like an emergency response over and over and over again.  

Adam  33:16   Yeah, that idea of band aid solution when I was chatting with Laura Mae Lindo, in that conversation, we talked about the idea that   we've kind of settled as the emergency response is the default solution in our minds. And that would be like calling an ambulance, and then the goal is to ride around in the ambulance for a few days until your wounds are all healed up and they'll drop you right back at home. And so that's not the solution. It's an emergency response. It's a vessel to try and get us to a path to healing. And so, yeah, incredible organizations are doing work there, but I think in some ways, not just  to take ownership ourselves as community members, not just levels of government, but I think us as community members often settle for, okay, well, there's shelters in our community, so we're doing well. If we had a bunch of ambulances, but no hospitals, but no rehabilitation facilities, but no houses with accessible entryways and living spaces, that would not be a solution. And that's kind of, I think, where especially in Kitchener Waterloo as the problem has grown, and by some forecasts, tripled in the last few years of folks who are street involved.  

And I say folks, and I don't just mean individuals, but I mean families,   partners with children, family units, blended families. And so I think, yeah, in a lot of ways we've settled for just put the emergency shelters where they need to be. And that's the first, or rather, that's the second stage after being street involved, after what we would traditionally call homelessness. That's the second stage on a housing continuum, that we want to see people advance further and further until they can have sustainable, affordable housing.  

Steph  35:19   Just to build on that a little bit. Absolutely, it's families and it's a chaotic hard time in life to not have housing.   This is families with pets, your partner. When you move into emergency shelter, you can't sleep beside anyone. There's rules like everyone has to have their own sleeping space, no pets.  So imagine not having a home and then having to give up your beloved cat or dog.   Yeah, people  are thankful, but they're so distraught and sad. This  the problem is so much bigger. So, yeah, offering like, your example with the ambulance or a band aid solution, it truly feels too when that's what you have to offer, it truly feels inadequate. 

Adam 36:23  As you look around at the potential of the next five or ten years in our community. To you, what would be,   what could Kitchener Waterloo look like in five to ten years in a way that   makes significant strides towards housing justice? What would our community look like? And again, that might not just be X-amount of affordable units or building in a certain spot. It might be   how we are informed in our neighborhoods and at a municipal level. It might be how we designate funds, like you said. It might be how we work with educational resources, how we work with students or families. Yeah. What would you love to see Kitchener Waterloo look like in five or ten years with housing justice?  

Steph 37:22  So this is my second time running for council. I ran in 2018, and at that time there was about 600 or so identified as homeless people or people living from the street. (So I guess you can't hear me, I use the air quotes).  

Adam 37:35  Yeah, I can see that. That's right.  

Steph Yeah.   And now, four years later, I'm running. That number is up over 1000. So I can tell you that another four years from now. I hope history does not repeat itself.   We're at this time where we can elect municipal leaders. I am hopeful, like, I am knocking on doors. And this is one thing I love about Ward Ten, truly,  is knocking on doors. People are up for how do we fix this? People are in. People want to deal with it. Very rarely do I hear the answer “Let's put them on a bus and ship them all away”. No, people want to deal with it. And I love that about Kitchener. I do, I love that.   The community is committed to being a place where people can have their needs met, where services can be accessed. And we're up for really working on solving this. So I'm so hopeful.   But as we head into election time, I just really urge people to do their research and pick regional counselors, pick school board trustees, pick mayors and counselors who you feel don't “other people” again, air quotes, but where you feel like they have a good understanding of these issues. And   I urge people to elect officials who are connected to these issues that aren't coming at this from   a far away lens, where they have personal experience,   where they have lots of empathy, and where they have already done the work in their professional lives to connect to these issues. So I am really hopeful because our community, having knocked on so many doors, and I'll be out there later today, even people are up for that challenge. And we have more than enough resources in KW to do this. It's just a matter of how we design this with wisdom and care and not just  quick fixes, but how do we apply wisdom to this? And we definitely, in this community, have a reputation for working together to problem solve.   So, again, I'm hopeful. I think we can consult and we can build something that fits KW.   And we're lucky to have experts like the Working Center, the House of Friendship. These are places  are committed and do this work full time, all the time,  (Adam  for years and years, way before this was something that made the headlines in Canadian newspapers or in local newspapers…)  They have been on the ground, day in and day out and at night. And absolutely, we have a really unique situation, too, where the Working Center is not something that is like in other cities. It's just our local piece. So there's a good understanding, there's   a good relationship there. I'd love to see the city and the region continue to support that work and really lean on their wisdom, lean on their experience   and make sure that the service and the systems we're providing really can help individuals, not just help numbers.  

Adam 41:22  Yes. And we're going to be chatting with, I think, representatives from both House of Friendship and Working Center and as well as organizations like Indwell, House of Friendship, there's so many that do really incredible work. And to be able to find ways to support those organizations, those organizations, Working Center,   Indwell, House of Friendship,  they need volunteers, they need people. And so that was kind of my as we kind of come to a close, I think the obvious thing, and you already touched on it, with an election coming up, is how we're able to inform ourselves and inform the vote that we cast. Beyond that, once October is done and the election has wrapped again, for me, I know myself, it's easy for me to then go, okay, I did my part for my community and my neighborhood and for this problem. And I can kind of just recede back into   my sort of safe spaces, the distance behind that glass window that I talked about. But this problem will persist no matter  what policies, and even if we have the dream policies happening at the government level, at every government level, this will be something that takes a long time and in fact, takes years and years for us to be able to start to kind of right the ship.  

Adam  42:56   So. What can regular people, everyday people, whether they are churchgoers at Trinity United Church, who are some of the people who help make this podcast possible, or young adults at the Hub, or just community members who want to make positive change? What can regular people do past election Day to make positive change and to make this a more just community in terms of housing?  

Steph 43:28   So I like to think about it…get involved in whatever way you can. Giving money is good and okay. Give money. If you have money, give it to  your local   not for profits doing the work.   Tent City, we have the Working Center thing long term. You can write checks, you can give money. You can do e transfers.   It's helpful. What that also does is it gives you a window, where you put your money is where you put your heart or your interest. So that might be your window into paying attention more, reading newsletters, finding out more information. And it might inspire you to continue to give, or it might inspire you to  volunteer with your time. So money or time? Time is kind of the way I like to think about it. Or both. Hopefully they lead into being people offering their services with both. But   if we're really serious about this as a community,   yes,  money is a big part of it.  

Adam  44:56   Yeah. And it can't be gotten around that these problems need financial investment, they need resources, and they need people who can get in and be on the ground and like you did for so many years, to be able to.   Invest   in solving this problem, whether that's through yeah, through finances, through volunteering, and or through forming relationships. And for those who I even think about, so many of these organizations need volunteers, not just in terms of someone who can be on the ground in interacting with the community members who their partner with and serving. But they need admin support. They need folks behind the scenes. They need folks who can field phone calls. And so if you're I think about people in my family who my girlfriend is an introvert, and so one of her big ways that she's served for many years in tackling this problem is she is involved with the KW Community Fridge. And so donating and not just donating food even, but they need people to clean that fridge. They need people to be able to help manage the inventory. And so there's all these community groups and organizations that are all over our city and our region, and there's so many different ways depending on where you're at and how your gifts fall and where you're wired to get involved. And so to be able to invest your time or your money is a huge thing that we need to be able to do.  

Steph 46:35  Another thing I want to mention is don't be scared to do it wrong. I think a lot of people think, what's the best organization to give us money to? What's the best? Like, how can we do this the best? And it doesn't need to be the best. Don't be afraid to make a mistake… you do the best you can with what you know and go from there. You'll keep learning and that might change where you want to put your money or your time. You might learn, you might meet someone, you might grow. So don't be afraid to make a mistake don't be afraid to do it wrong.   The sooner you start, the more time you have to be connected and learn about the issue. So   jump in. Yes, but even just dip your toe in if you want and it's okay if you change your mind.   But just know   it's really something that comes from a heart and from a soul. And so our minds can sometimes get in the way.   Lead with your heart   and go see what you learn.  

Adam 47:48  Awesome Steph. Where can people follow your work, your projects, and particularly with this campaign, where can people follow and get involved?  

Steph 48:00  Okay, so, yeah, you can visit my website, which is votestretch22.ca  on there you can read about  me and ways to get involved. You can sign up to be a volunteer. It is crunch time. We are in the thick of campaign season and I need help. Just like Adam was saying. I need help on the admin side. I need help. Door knocking. There's lots of different ways. (Adam- That was a perfect pre plug.)  Yeah, I need help with social media. Yeah, there are so many ways. I need financial help. I need all the help.   Like you were saying earlier, there's no political party. Like it's just me and my funds and then the people that want to chip in on that.   Yes, help. Please check out my website. You can also follow me on any social media platform. I think I'm on most of them and my handles @votestretch for all of them. So, website.   VoteStretch22 and then social media handles are just @votestretch. But check it out. Follow along.   Yeah, I'm feeling, I'm feeling good. I've done some good things along the way and just hoping to kind of sprint to the finish line and give it my all in this last little bit. There are six people running in Ward Ten Kitchener, so it's quite the rice.  

Adam  49:32  Yeah, and I can say as someone who is not a professional podcast and doesn't care if I come off and show my bias, I'm very much rooting for you and I will be knocking on doors for Stretch, for Stretch 22 in the weeks to come. And so, yeah, I'm very grateful for you joining us today, Steph, and for all the ways that you poured into  the camp and hub community that we come from over the years. And yeah, for being able to sit down and make time today and even more grateful for the ongoing work that you've done over many years and hopefully into a city council seat in the future. So thank you so much for chatting and for giving us shedding light on wisdom and relationships and where local politics can really make such a huge impact. And my hope and my prayer is that as we go forward, we can develop those teeth and continue to take the little bites out of the problem where we can, but also start to be able to take those bigger bites. So I'm taking a lot away from this conversation and I'm really thankful for you coming on here. So, thanks for being here today, Steph. 

Steph  50:48     Well, it's my pleasure, Adam. I was admittedly nervous because I haven't done a podcast before, but this is great. Thanks so much for asking me!  

Adam 51:00    Awesome. Yeah, so we will post the handles where you can get involved with Steph campaign on the posters and the promos on the social media and we will also put some links in the description for this podcast. So, thanks very much, everybody. We will chat with you next time. See you later. bye.