QUALIFICATIONS

Education and Experience:

• Degree in Social Sciences or other related discipline, preferably at the Master’s level and considerable experience related to the work, or an equivalent combination of education and experience.
• Specific education focused on youth development and/or experience working with disadvantaged youth is considered an asset.
• Considerable experience with grants programs (writing, reviewing, evaluating, and prioritizing community grants requests). Experience in public engagement and planning processes and report writing.

Knowledge, Skills and Abilities:

• Considerable knowledge and understanding of social sustainability, social development, quality of life indicators and social cohesion, particularly in the context of youth development;
• Considerable knowledge of equity principles, including intersectionality, and equity based interventions, including applicability to funding practices;
• Thorough knowledge of the theory, practice and objectives of social planning.
• Working knowledge of local organizations, including youth serving and youth led organizations, Indigenous organizations, organizations serving racialized communities, and other social agencies and services operating in Vancouver;
• Excellent facilitation skills;
• Ability to work effectively in a socially diverse context with communities that face economic, social or cultural disadvantages;
• Ability to navigate complex and sensitive conversations with tact;
• Ability to develop and lead complex initiatives, and creating collaborative partnerships;
• Ability to working effectively with civic, provincial and federal levels of government;
• Ability to influence others, both internal City and external partners, towards common goals;
• Ability to supervise staff, contractors, and managing budgets;
• Strong organizational skills and ability to manage multiple initiatives, projects, report on outcomes, and meet deadlines;
• Ability to exercise good judgment, initiative and work independently as well as part of a team; and,
• Ability to meet transportation needs of the department.

Where operationally appropriate and subject to change, the City of Vancouver has a Flexible Work Program. This program allows staff to work a hybrid work week from locations that are a daily commutable distance from their work at a City worksite. At this time this position is eligible to be part of the Flexible Work Program.
Business Unit/Department: Arts, Culture and Community Services (1200)
Affiliation: CUPE 15 Non Pks
Employment Type: Temporary Full Time
Position Start Date: October, 2025
Position End Date: April, 2026
Salary Information: Pay Grade GR-031: $56.27 to $66.55 per hour

MAIN PURPOSE AND FUNCTION

The Social Planner – Youth Safety leads the implementation of a federally funded Building Safer Communities Fund program (BSCF) in Vancouver. BSCF seeks to prevent and address the risk factors and root causes of youth violence by collaborating with young people and communities to develop community led prevention and intervention strategies and initiatives. The initiative addresses inequities that negatively impact the social determinants of health, including racism, bullying, stigmatization and poverty, and is critical in the achievement of key social sustainability goals including building safe and inclusive communities for children and youth, as outlined in the Healthy City Strategy, the City of Vancouver’s social sustainability plan.

SPECIFIC DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES

• Convenes dialogues with youth, community agencies, other levels of government and other funders, identifying issues of concern regarding youth safety in Vancouver.
• Develops and implements a comprehensive three year youth violence prevention/intervention plan, including budget estimates/allocations, an evaluation framework and a sustainability plan, in consultation and partnership with community.
• Manages the $4M budget assigned to this project by the federal funder.
• Leads the development and coordination of a youth safety focused funding stream including informing, reviewing, evaluation, prioritization of grant requests and ensures that approved funding proposals align with federal grant program guidelines and objectives. Reviews and revises grants priorities and/or criteria as required.
• Supports alignment of youth safety initiatives and grants to major City of Vancouver initiatives including the Healthy City Strategy targets/goals, City of Reconciliation commitments, the Equity Framework, Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women, Girls and Two-spirit project recommendations, the Accessibility Strategy and anti-racism and cultural redress initiatives.
• Works to develop or enhance data systems to support data gathering in order to build capacity to better understand the nature, scope and impacts of the types of prevention and intervention initiatives implemented and to report on the results achieved.
• Formulates and presents recommendations to City Council, City leadership team, other levels of government and community.
• Writes and presents reports to City Council that outline policies, programs and issues for Council consideration.
• Supervises staff and consultants as needed.
• Prepares and submits reports to federal funders consistent with requirements.
• Other duties/responsibilities as assigned.