Two more organizations have signed Belleville's Workplace Inclusion Charter.

The City announced on Wednesday that META Employment Services and the Bay of Quinte Regional Marketing Board signed the charter.

“Both of these organizations play such an important role in the growth and development of our community,” said Mayor Neil Ellis. “By signing the charter, we know that they will contribute so much to our mission of building a more inclusive and welcoming city. I would like to thank META Employment Services, the Bay of Quinte Regional Marketing Board and all of the businesses who have made their commitment so far. We can’t wait to see what is in store.”

With these most recent signings there are now 19 businesses that have adopted the charter.

The goal of the charter is to encourage local businesses and organizations to make a commitment to inclusion in the workplace through planning, setting achievable goals that move their workplace forward and deploying a variety of tactics to meet those goals.

META Employment Services has implemented a number of inclusive practices into their workplace, including: using hiring practices to create a team with a diverse background in education, culture and ability level to strengthen their capacity for inclusivity in the workplace, adopting inclusive language, looking for ways to celebrate diversity and community engagement through event sponsorship and collaboration with local partners, implementing regular assessments of their operations to find ways they can become more inclusive, ensuring transparency at all levels and providing opportunities for genuine feedback, offering flexible schedules for staff, hosting year-round events to build their office community, recognizing all provincial and federal statutory holidays and providing paid time off, providing ample paid personal time, monthly meetings to encourage collaboration, adopting a “One-on-One Meeting Policy” to provide staff with individualized time with supervisors and adopting a Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Policy.

“The Workplace Inclusion Charter perfectly aligns with our goals as an organization,” said META Employment Services Executive Director Sandra Leslie. “Ultimately, our mission is to provide employment related services to facilitate resilient, vibrant and ever-changing communities. We envision a community where all individuals can contribute to their full potential and our values are based in inclusion, integrity, professionalism, collaboration, innovation and transparency.”

In addition to sustaining and building on these practices going forward, META Employment Services will also be posting their commitment to the Workplace Inclusion Charter publicly to ensure accountability for years to come.

The Bay of Quinte Regional Marketing Board is very mindful of working on projects where inclusion is a focal point, creating a top-down approach to inclusion within the workplace. This inclusive way of thinking has naturally become woven into the way they operate each day in the office and out in the community.

The board and staff have undertaken a number of initiatives over the years to promote inclusion in the workplace and community at-large, including: working with the United Nations Association of Canada Quinte Branch to plan and deliver a number of inclusion events, working in collaboration with the Canadian Gay & Lesbian Chamber of Commerce and community allies to create an LGBT+ tourism strategy for the region - a process which also resulted in multiple educational workshops related to inclusion and the LGBT+ community(delivered in collaboration with Bay of Quinte Pride), taking part in a number of local Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Committees, actively creating content related to accessibility and actively working with the Quinte Local Immigration Partnership on projects related to welcoming new Canadians to the Quinte region from all corners of the globe.

“The mandates of the Bay of Quinte Regional Marketing Board are to attract people here - for tourism, work and as new residents,” said Bay of Quinte Regional Marketing Board Executive Director Dug Stevenson. “If we aren't active stewards in helping to make our communities more inclusive and safe places to be and to work in, then we aren't fulfilling our mandates. We also want to help create opportunities for dialogue around inclusion with other organizations in the region and this is an excellent platform for that.”

When it comes to next steps, the team will continue to work with community partners across multiple projects where inclusion is a central component to ensure they are helping to lead the region in creating a safe and inclusive Bay of Quinte. They will also continue to be mindful of inclusive practices related to hiring and the election of Directors for our Board.