SOCIAL PROCUREMENT Mapping Existing and Potential Opportunities for

Social Enterprise on Vancouver Island

Prepared for Vancouver Island Social Innovation Zone and seCatalyst

July 2017

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Table of Contents

Acknowledgements ................................................................................................................. 3

Executive Summary ................................................................................................................. 4 Summary of Opportunities and Recommendations .................................................................................. 5

1. Introduction .................................................................................................................... 6

2. Vancouver Island Social Procurement Scan ........................................................................ 7 2.1 Anchor Institutions – an overview ........................................................................................................... 7 2.2 Institutional spending on Vancouver Island ............................................................................................ 8 2.3 Social Procurement Policies, Frameworks and Action plans ................................................................... 8 2.4 Policy/Framework Implementation – by sector .................................................................................... 10

Food Services ........................................................................................................................................... 10 Construction ............................................................................................................................................ 11 Information technology ........................................................................................................................... 12 Facilities and Maintenance...................................................................................................................... 12

2.5 Estimating Addressable Spend .............................................................................................................. 13

3. Scan of Social Benefit Suppliers ....................................................................................... 14 3.1 Social Enterprise .................................................................................................................................... 14 3.3 Aboriginal-owned businesses ......................................................................................................... 15 3.2 Traditional business ............................................................................................................................... 15

Construction companies .......................................................................................................................... 16 Information technology companies......................................................................................................... 16

4 Barriers to Social Procurement........................................................................................ 17 4.1 Barriers among demand-side actors: .................................................................................................... 17 4.2 Barriers among supply-side actors ........................................................................................................ 18 4.3 Barriers in the ecosystem ...................................................................................................................... 19

5 Opportunities and Recommendations ............................................................................. 19 5.1 Innovate Procurement Practices ....................................................................................................... 19 5.2 Build Capacity for Measuring and Evaluating Social Benefits ........................................................... 22 5.3 Build Social Enterprise Capacity ........................................................................................................ 24 5.4 Toward an Enabling Policy Environment ........................................................................................... 25

6 Conclusion .................................................................................................................... 26

Resources............................................................................................................................. 27

Appendix A: Anchors with Social Procurement Policies, Frameworks, Guidelines or Action Plans .. 29

Appendix B: Pilot Initiatives/Exploring Social procurement ........................................................ 30

Appendix C: AVICC Social Procurement Resolution ................................................................... 31

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Acknowledgements The researcher (Heather Hachigian) is grateful to the interviewees (see appendix) for sharing their ideas, knowledge and experiences. The researcher is also grateful to those that provided feedback on the draft report: Kristi Fairholm Mader, Sandra Hamilton, David LePage and the Vancouver Island Social Innovation Zone Social Finance and Social Procurement Working Group. Any errors and/or omissions are the sole responsibility of the researcher.

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Executive Summary The objective of this research is to identify how existing and potential social procurement opportunities on Vancouver Island can contribute to strengthening the social enterprise ecosystem. The findings from this initial mapping will be used to help prepare social enterprises and ventures for existing and emerging opportunities. Social enterprises and ventures are businesses that provide goods or services with a stated purpose to achieve social, environmental and economic benefits for underserved communities.1 These organizations can include non-profits, cooperatives, for-profits and, in BC, community contribution companies. Social procurement is a strategic approach to purchasing goods and services and investing in infrastructure that intentionally seeks to generate positive social impacts.2 It requires contracting authorities to evaluate value for money by considering social and community benefits alongside traditional procurement criteria. While strengthening social enterprises and ventures is one potential outcome, it is important to recognize that social procurement represents a broader set of opportunities to signal the value of social and community benefits to all suppliers and providers in the market. The Opportunity: Local governments, universities, colleges, public schools and hospitals on Vancouver Island spend millions each year on social programs and initiatives, such as local economic development, preventative health programs, poverty alleviation, indigenous reconciliation and youth employment. At the same time, these institutions purchase over $1.5 billion of goods and services each year. Organizations representing over $300 million of annual spending on goods and services are exploring how and/or taking steps to align their broader policy objectives with their spending to achieve better value for money. This alignment represents a significant opportunity for social enterprise/ventures on Vancouver Island to directly sell under-threshold goods and services and to sub-contract with larger suppliers. Research Method: Literature review, review of council minutes, financial statements and media reports, on-line survey questionnaire sent to financial officers at over 60 public and private sector organizations on Vancouver Island and nine interviews (telephone and in-person) with procurement professionals and social procurement experts. The report relies on a limited sample of data collected from surveys and interviews in June 2017, and is intended to serve as a baseline study. Key Findings: Food services, information technology, construction and facilities and maintenance represent the most common areas of spending where social and community benefit criteria are currently applied. The most common social benefit provided by contractors is employment and training opportunities for disadvantaged populations, including youth, aboriginal populations and persons with disabilities. Only a few procurement managers report that they have directly purchased goods or services from a social enterprise or venture. The most frequently cited reasons for not contracting with or purchasing from social enterprise include lack of awareness of social enterprise, lack of capacity among procurement officials to educate social enterprise about how to be vendors and a lack of capacity among social enterprise to deliver at a scale required by institutional buyers. Implications: Public and private institutions on Vancouver Island with considerable purchasing power are beginning to integrate social and community benefits into their procurement and tendering. Social enterprises and ventures are at risk of being excluded from these opportunities. Institutional buyers must work to increase the diversity of their supply chains. At the same time, supply-side actors and intermediaries must work to ensure social enterprise can effectively respond to emerging opportunities.

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Summary of Opportunities and Recommendations This report finds that both demand-side and supply-side actors have a role to play to ensure inclusion of social enterprise and ventures in social procurement opportunities. The list below summarizes some of the most common opportunities identified by interviewees.3 Demand side Institutional buyers must work to increase the diversity of their supply chains.

• Innovate contract design and process: Most experts agree that institutional buyers should consider opportunities for unbundling contracts, simplifying the RFP process and exploring other contract innovations to allow a more diverse range of suppliers and providers to bid on contracts.

• Engage with large suppliers: In cases where smaller contract size is not feasible or desirable, institutional buyers can engage with large proponents to encourage and even require them to embed social benefits and to create sub-contract opportunities.

• Engage with small/diversity suppliers: Most interviewees emphasized that institutional buyers have a role to play in supporting and educating small suppliers about the procurement process and teaching them how to be a vendor.

• Identify new suppliers: Several opportunities for finding diversity suppliers were identified in the research, including engaging directly with suppliers, hosting reverse trade-shows to advertise opportunities to potential suppliers and providers; establishing an on-line registry and directory of opportunities, including sub-contract opportunities; and third-party certifications.

Supply side Supply-side actors and intermediaries must ensure social enterprise and ventures can effectively respond to emerging opportunities.

• Build social enterprise and venture capacity and awareness: Intermediaries should help to build social enterprise build capacity through training, education and financial support (e.g., blended capital to improve their financial position) and help to build awareness of social enterprise and ventures among public and private sector buyers and sub-contractors.

• Identify gaps and opportunities: Social enterprise and venture leaders should consider how their business model and social purpose can respond to existing and potential social procurement opportunities on Vancouver Island.

• Engage with institutional buyers: Social enterprise and ventures should explore opportunities for engaging with institutional buyers. Intermediaries should consider opportunities for facilitating these cross-sector networking and relationship-building opportunities.

• Explore sub-contract and partnership opportunities: Social enterprise leaders and intermediaries should explore opportunities for partnership with traditional business and strategies to support these types of partnerships.

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1. Introduction In response to fiscal pressures and complex social problems, universities, hospitals and governments around the world are leveraging their considerable purchasing power to unlock greater value by adopting social procurement policies. Social procurement is an innovative approach to purchasing goods and services and investing in infrastructure in ways that achieve better value for money by considering social and community benefits alongside traditional procurement criteria. For example, by encouraging their contractors to create apprenticeship and training opportunities for individuals that face barriers to employment, local governments can generate additional social and economic benefits for their communities and cost savings across other areas of their spending. The objective of this research is to identify how existing and potential social procurement opportunities on Vancouver Island can contribute to strengthening the social enterprise sector. There are several ways that social enterprises and ventures - businesses with a stated purpose to achieve social benefits for underserved communities - can benefit from social procurement, including access to new markets to directly sell their goods and services, new partnerships and sub-contract opportunities and enhanced competitiveness. Moreover, social enterprise/ventures can benefit from capacity-building and technical supports from procurement professionals and intermediaries. It is important to note that social procurement does not require contracting exclusively with social enterprise. All providers and suppliers have the potential to generate positive social impacts. That said, social enterprises are often well positioned to deliver social and community benefits given their unique form and function. This report argues that more coordinated effort among institutional buyers and intermediaries is needed to ensure social ventures on the Island can effectively respond to emerging social procurement opportunities. Vancouver Island is home to over 40 local and regional governments, 138 hospitals and long-term care facilities, 3 large credit unions, 5 higher education institutions and several large societies and foundations. Collectively, these institutional buyers represent over $5.4 billion on total operating expenses in fiscal year 2015/16. This includes $3.1 billion in employee salaries and benefits and $1.5 billion on goods and services.4 At least seven of these organizations representing over $300 million in total spending on goods and services have adopted a social procurement policy, framework or action plan or are in the process of doing so, and at least six institutional buyers have engaged in pilots.5 The report is informed by a review of literature, a document review of financial statements and procurement policies of public and private-sector buyers, an on-line survey and interviews with nine key informants. The research maps existing and future social procurement opportunities for social enterprise and ventures on Vancouver Island. The report relies on a limited sample of data and is intended as initial baseline study. More detailed assessment – including more precise estimates of addressable spend, an account of the supply-side experience with procurement and a mapping of potential sub-contract opportunities for social enterprise – are identified as priorities for future research. The remainder of the report is organized as follows. The next section presents findings from a scan of social procurement opportunities for social enterprise on Vancouver Island. The report then identifies the most significant barriers to leveraging social procurement to strengthen the social enterprise sector, drawing on the literature, survey responses and interviews with key informants. The report concludes with consideration for the opportunities and recommended strategies for advancing social procurement on Vancouver Island.

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2. Vancouver Island Social Procurement Scan

2.1 Anchor Institutions – an overview This scan maps existing and potential social procurement opportunities among large, public and private sector buyers on Vancouver Island. It focuses on anchor institutions, defined as place-based institutions that are “inextricably linked to the vitality and health of their surrounding communities.”6 Given this relationship with their communities, anchor institutions have a strong incentive to leverage their procurement processes and purchasing (and other areas of business such as investing and hiring) to achieve positive social, economic and environmental impacts in their communities.7 While the anchor term is most often applied to universities and hospitals, other public and private institutions that have deep connections with their communities, such as large non-profit organizations, credit unions, private businesses and local governments, can also act as anchors in their communities.8 The anchor institution concept is most relevant to procurement strategies that aim to support and promote healthy local communities but it can also be linked to social procurement.9 Social procurement refers to leveraging purchasing to generate positive social impacts, regardless of location. Local procurement prioritizes purchasing from the surrounding community, where it is implied that doing so will generate positive social impacts for those communities. This report focuses on social procurement but where relevant, it also identifies local procurement policies and pilots. This scan included over 40 local and regional governments, the Vancouver Island Health Authority (which represents a significant portion of spending by hospitals and long-term care facilities on the Island), 3 universities, 2 colleges and the 3 large school board districts. Private organizations that may act like anchor institutions include the Fairmont Empress Hotel and 3 of the largest credit unions on Vancouver Island. The study also identified 5 non-profit organizations that act as anchor institutions, given their size and connections to the community, including two port authorities, the Victoria Foundation, the Greater Victoria Public Library and the Greater Victoria Housing Society. The scan excludes most anchor institutions/local governments with less than $5 million in operating expenditures to focus on the largest opportunities.10 It also excludes most provincial government departments and crown corporations to avoid double counting expenditures, since their expenditures are largely made in the form of transfers to other anchor institutions.11 The scan relies primarily on publicly available information to estimate the addressable spend, defined as the potential procurement and infrastructure investment dollars that could be leveraged to achieve social and community benefits. There are several limitations to relying on financial statements to estimate addressable spend. A more accurate estimate of spend would require a detailed breakdown of operational expenditures for each institutional buyer to remove statutory obligations such as tax expenditures and amortization and interest payments, expenses paid to other anchor institutions (e.g., transfer payments between governments) and goods and services for which there are no obvious social benefit associated with their purchase. It would also require removing some long-term contracts in cases where anchor institutions and local governments have little influence over changing how the contractor operates and cannot switch providers or suppliers without incurring penalties.12

In cases where detail was provided in the financial statements or directly from the anchor, operational expenses were adjusted to remove expenditures that are obviously not eligible for social procurement. For example, capital asset depreciation, taxes and interest payments were removed from many anchor

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institutions’ total expenditures. In most cases, publicly available financial reports do not provide sufficient detail to estimate addressable spend, and as such, it is likely that the addressable spend is over-estimated. Nonetheless, this estimate provides a useful starting point for understanding the considerable purchasing power of anchor institutions and highlights some of the most promising opportunities on Vancouver Island.

2.2 Institutional spending on Vancouver Island

The total annual operating expenses for all anchor institutions and local governments identified in this study in fiscal year 2015/2016, excluding salaries and benefits, is approximately $2.3 billion. Removing from this estimate the abovementioned expenditures for which there is no obvious potential for generating a social or community benefit, the total ‘addressable spend’ is estimated to be $1.5 billion.

*Source: Various financial statements 2015/16 (or most recent available at time of writing)

The Vancouver Island Health Authority is the largest purchaser, spending over $700 M on ‘addressable’ goods and services each year. Local governments and credit unions were also among the largest spenders on Vancouver Island: In 2016, the University of Victoria spent $78 M, the City of Victoria spent $48.3 M and Vancity Savings Credit Union spent $121 M on local goods and services (across all regions).13

2.3 Social Procurement Policies, Frameworks and Action plans Many of the largest anchor institutions and governments in terms of annual expenditures on goods and services (Vancity, City of Victoria; District of Saanich and University of Victoria) have begun to experiment with social procurement, either through participation in pilot initiatives or by adopting a formal policy, framework or action plan. Some smaller local governments have also adopted social procurement policies or frameworks. The Village of Cumberland was the first Certified Buy Social municipality in Canada. Cumberland was also the first municipality in BC to proactively leverage existing spending to improve social outcomes in the community.14 The Town of Qualicum Beach was the first municipality to adopt a formal social procurement policy in Canada. School District 85 on North Vancouver Island has a local preference procurement policy for under-threshold purchases.

$946.3

$679.1

$352.6 $304.3

$36.9

$745.6

$355.7 $267.2

$129.3

$14.6

$-

$100.0

$200.0

$300.0

$400.0

$500.0

$600.0

$700.0

$800.0

$900.0

$1,000.0

Public Hospitals andSchools

Local and RegionalGovernments

Private AnchorInstitutions

Universities andColleges

Non-profits andSocieties

Total Spending vs. Addressable Spend

Total Operating Expenses Addressable spend

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Note: Vancity estimate includes estimated purchasing from local business across lower mainland and Vancouver Island.

The total spending on goods and services that is currently subject to or expected to be subject to a formal social procurement policy framework is estimated at $300 M or approximately 20 per cent of addressable spend on Vancouver Island. This does not mean that $300 M is actually being spent on goods and services that explicitly integrate social benefits. Most anchor institutions and local governments that have adopted policies or frameworks have yet to integrate social criteria into their procurement process. Others are in the early stages of planning for a pilot initiative. Moreover, as mentioned previously, it is likely that this figure over-estimates the total addressable spend, since it includes long-term contracts and goods and services for which there may not be an obvious and aligned social benefit opportunity. The estimate is intended to provide an indication of the potential opportunity that is emerging on Vancouver Island. The figure below provides a snapshot of where anchor institutions and local governments fall along the spectrum of integrating social benefit criteria across all their relevant procurement decisions. It is important to note that some of these organizations are actively moving along the spectrum. For example, the City of Victoria is developing a framework and policy for social procurement and the Town of Ladysmith is working to adopting a social procurement policy.15 Others on the Island may also have social procurement strategies that are not captured in this scan. Figure 1: Progression of social procurement on Vancouver Island

$121.00

$78.40

$48.30 $40.10

$4.90 $4.60

$-

$20.00

$40.00

$60.00

$80.00

$100.00

$120.00

$140.00

Vancity SavingsCredit Union

University ofVictoria

City of Victoria District ofSaanich

Village ofCumberland

Town ofQualicum

Beach

POLICY/FRAMEWORK/ACTION PLAN & ANNUAL SPENDING ON G&S

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2.4 Policy/Framework Implementation – by sector Having a social procurement policy or framework is no guarantee that social and community benefits will be generated. To better understand the progress of anchor institutions on Vancouver Island in meeting their stated policy objectives, this section reviews examples of policies and frameworks that have been applied in practice. It also identifies examples of anchor institutions and local governments that are experimenting with pilots. While most social procurement policies, frameworks and pilots will apply to total addressable spend, the scan found that in practice, these policies and frameworks tend to be applied most often to four categories of spending – food services, construction, information technology and building and facilities maintenance (e.g. security, janitorial services, landscaping). The most common social benefit that has been provided by contractors is employment and training opportunities for disadvantaged populations, including youth, newcomers, aboriginal populations and persons with disabilities. That said, the scan identifies a range of other social benefits that are targeted, including enhanced food security, mental health supports, economic development in underserved areas, strengthening social enterprises and local SMEs and increased investment in public spaces.

Food Services All organizations identified in the scan spend money on food. For some buyers, such as local governments, food is a minor expenditure (e.g., catering special events) relative to their core operating expenses. But for others, such as hospitals and long-term care facilities, food is a significant expenditure. Several anchor institutions and local governments are experimenting with pilot programs and have adopted policies to introduce more local and organic food into their supply chains. Proponents argue that purchasing local and organic food can generate several social benefits, including enhanced food security, strengthening the value chain, promoting economic development by supporting local farmers and social enterprise, improving the quality of food provided in hospitals and reducing the carbon emissions associated with transportation of food. Several anchor institutions and local governments have formal policies or have engaged in pilot programs that focus on local food procurement. Saanich targets 40 per cent local food in its total food budget. Local food is defined by the City as “food that is grown on Vancouver Island and within British Columbia.” The University of Victoria reports that “35 per cent of dining services food and beverage spending that are third-party verified under sustainability standards or both local and community based.” Local food is defined by the University as food that is sourced within a 400-km radius. Vancity purchases local and organic food for special events and supports local food producers and distributors with investment capital. Camosun College does not have a formal policy but does ask its contracted food services manager to integrate local food into its supply chain.16 The Fairmont Empress chef is a member of the Island Chefs Collaborative, an initiative to promote better access to local food. Where relevant, BC Hydro asks proponents to explain “how they would bring local food into cafeterias and support local communities.”17 One interviewee suggested that long-term care facilities represent a significant opportunity for selling local food, given the growth that is expected in demand for these facilities on Vancouver Island as the population continues to age. The social benefits targeted by local food procurement policies and pilots are varied. Some focus only on enhanced food security. Others target a broader range of benefits, including local economic development by supporting local farmers, reduced carbon emissions from transportation of food and improved access

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to healthy food. The North Island College FEED Comox Valley project, an initiative funded by the J.W. McConnell Foundation, concluded that forward contracts with publicly funded institutions, could offer the stability of demand required to enable next generation farmers to increase productivity and supply institutions on a commercial scale.18

The North Island College FEED (Food, Environment and Economic Development) Comox Valley project was launched in 2014, with grant funding from the J.W. McConnell Family Foundation. The Comox Valley Regional District provided $50,000 in matching funds from the federal Gas Tax Fund. The project introduced farm-direct deliveries to the North Island College (NIC), St. Joseph’s Hospital and Glacier View Lodge. The project also worked with Island Health to better understand the challenges faced by the hospitals when trying to source local food. In addition to providing residents with access to fresh, local food, the initiative provides support to local farmers to sell their products to institutional markets. Source: McConnell Report, 2017

Construction In 2014-15, over $200 million has been invested and committed to infrastructure on Vancouver Island by federal, provincial and local governments.19 As existing infrastructure comes due for replacement and population growth places increasing demands for new infrastructure, construction projects represent a significant opportunity to introduce community and social benefit criteria into contracting. Furthermore, several interviewees noted that Vancouver Island faces a unique set of challenges, as construction costs tend to be higher on the Island and labour is in short supply. This can lead to significant risk of delay in construction projects for anchor institutions. Community benefits in infrastructure investments often include the provision of training and apprenticeship opportunities for local individuals that face barriers to employment. Other examples of community benefits include the construction of green infrastructure that provides benefits to the environment such as renewable energy and the creation of community spaces such as parks in the construction of new infrastructure projects. Given the relatively large size of construction contracts and the tendency to bundle the design-build phases, it is unlikely that construction will represent significant opportunities for direct contracting with social ventures, at least in the short-term. That said, some interviewees noted that construction contracts provide an opportunity to introduce social ventures and aboriginal business into the supply chain through sub-contract arrangements. Social enterprise can provide goods and services to construction firms, such as catering, security and property management. In many of BC Hydro’s construction contracts, contractors are required to demonstrate aboriginal engagement and participation. A recent example of a contract that included a requirement to contract with businesses that create economic opportunities for aboriginal populations was a project to decommission a dam near Gold River, BC. The winning contractor hired 5,000 hours of aboriginal labour. The contractor’s own workforce consisted of over 40 per cent of aboriginal employees.20 In an affordable rental housing project, BC Housing provides units for Blade Runners, a group based in Vancouver’s downtown eastside that assist individuals facing barriers to employment to find employment in construction industries. Some of the program’s participants helped to renovate the building.21 The Village of Cumberland has applied social benefit criteria to at least four infrastructure investments under its social procurement framework. In 2015, following Council’s implementation of their Social

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Procurement Framework, the Village began to introduce community benefit conditions in pre-qualifying tenders in major infrastructure projects, including the $2.9 million Dunsmuir Corridor project to rehabilitate underground sewer and water services and reconstruct Cumberland’s commercial main street and the $3 million reconstruction of the Cumberland/Bevan Road gateway. Tenders for both projects included requirements for proponents to explain how they can satisfy Cumberland’s Social Procurement Framework goals.22 Meeting the Social Procurement Framework goals is a precondition to being able to bid on the work. Understanding the opportunity and complexity of achieving more social value through publicly funded infrastructure tenders, in 2016 Sandra Hamilton developed, and is now leading an infrastructure pilot. The goal of the pilot is to work with industry to design a standardized approach to incorporating community benefits into the infrastructure procurement process. Pilot collaborators include the City of Victoria, the Town of Qualicum Beach, the City of Campbell River; the Vancouver Island Construction Association and the Construction Foundation of British Columbia. Collaborators agreed that the social value focus of the pilot would be, strengthening pathways to skills training and careers in construction, for those facing barriers to employment. It is anticipated that the pilot will contribute to achieving policy goals in areas such as inclusive economic development, indigenous economic reconciliation, skills training and workforce development, youth employment, supply chain diversity and social enterprise capacity building.23

Information technology

Another area that was identified by interviewees as a significant opportunity for integrating social benefit criteria is information technology services. Social benefits targeted in this sector include employment and training for vulnerable populations, including newcomers, aboriginal populations, persons with disabilities and mental health challenges. There are many basic administrative services associated with the delivery of IT services. For example, Vancity Savings Credit Union has identified basic IT services such as hardware installation services as an opportunity for implementing Living Wage.

Facilities and Maintenance

Many anchor institutions and governments contract with external providers for facilities and maintenance services, which includes security services for buildings they own or rent, landscaping services, janitorial services and repairs.

BC Housing has developed targets in its procurement policy related to social benefits. The targets encourages staff to consider social benefits. The Crown Corporation has reported that the impact of this new approach to procurement is changing the diversity of suppliers.24 One example of a social enterprise that has been contracted by BC Housing to remove waste from properties is Clean Start, which provides employment opportunities to persons facing barriers to employment. BC Housing has also awarded a contract for food services to a social enterprise that creates jobs for individuals facing barriers to employment. While most examples are social enterprise in the lower mainland, “BC Housing is looking to push the program further by developing opportunities for social enterprises on smaller scale projects.”25

The City of Courtenay is considering a pilot project to explore the potential of social benefit criteria applied to landscaping and janitorial services. The City has also considered pilots for on-call trades contractors, a civil construction capital project and a vehicle fleet replacement.26 The potential social

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benefits that may be considered in procurement for these services include local economic development, diversity in suppliers for municipal contracts, opportunities for youth training and apprenticeship, innovation and entrepreneurialism and signaling to the market place that social benefits are valued by the City. As of December, 2016, the City is in stage 2 of a 4-stage pilot process.27

Example of Courtenay’s Proposed Social Procurement Evaluation Criteria

• Does the vendor hire dis-advantaged persons for on-call, casual or permanent paid employment? • Does the vendor provide meaningful work experience for dis-advantaged persons?

• Is the vendor locally owned and operated?

• Does the vendor provide a mentoring or apprentice program?

• Does the vendor utilize local entrepreneurs/start-up businesses to support their business?

Other examples of social procurement include the Ministry of Social Development and Social Innovation’s RFP for security services at ministry offices in the lower mainland. The RFP integrated social benefit requirements related to employment opportunities into the contract. The successful proponent ‘committed to fill up to 25 per cent of all vacancies within the company by recruiting individuals who receive income or disability assistance.’28 Vancity identifies security services as a vulnerable sector and advocates for contractors to pay a living wage. The Village of Cumberland hires an external contractor, which is a non-profit society, to manage its Lake Park Campground and contracts with a street litter removal program run by the Beaufort Association for the Mentally Handicap. The Village included social benefit criteria in its tender for a skateboard park. As one interviewee notes, “if you look closely enough, you will find opportunities across your spending.”

2.5 Estimating Addressable Spend Public and private sector buyers on Vancouver Island representing a range of organizations including hospitals, public schools, private sector organizations, local governments and higher education institutions are beginning to experiment with social procurement. In 2016, the Association of Vancouver Island and Coastal Communities passed a resolution to advance the use of social procurement by local governments and to advocate for changes to the Local Government Act and the Community Charter. To date, five local governments on Vancouver Island have adopted social procurement policies, frameworks and/or pilots. Higher education institutions have also made some progress. In 2017, the University of Victoria received an A for its sustainable procurement practices from the Association of Sustainable Education.29 In 2015, inspired by the work of the NIC FEED Comox Valley initiative, the Comox-Strathcona Regional Hospital Board voted in favour of writing Island Health to request consideration of a social procurement policy around local food procurement for all hospitals.30 Organizations representing over $300 million of annual spending on goods and services are exploring and/or taking steps to align their broader (social) policy objectives with their spending to achieve better value for money. While encouraging more anchor institutions and local governments across Vancouver Island and British Columbia to adopt a social procurement policy should be a priority, equally important is ensuring that the policies and frameworks that have already been adopted are meaningfully implemented to reach their full potential. If anchor institutions and local governments committed to ensuring just 5% of their total contracts and purchasing were directed toward contract and sub-contract opportunities for social enterprise/ventures, this could make a substantial contribution to strengthening the social enterprise ecosystem on Vancouver Island.

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*This figure includes all geographic areas of the credit union’s annual spending in 2016, including lower mainland. More precise

estimate of Vancouver Island was not available.

3. Scan of Social Benefit Suppliers The feasibility of a robust social value marketplace depends, not only the willingness of anchor institutions and local governments to adopt and implement social procurement policies but also, on suppliers who are willing and able to respond to social procurement opportunities. Almost all contractors and service providers have the potential to embed social value into their core operations. Indeed, an indicator of a successful social procurement policy is that it signals to the market that social benefits are valued, alongside traditional procurement criteria such as qualifications, cost efficiencies and a track record of success.31 This section maps the suppliers on Vancouver Island that have the potential to respond to social procurement opportunities.

3.1 Social Enterprise In September 2015, the Vancouver Island Social Innovation Zone mapped and verified 119 social enterprises on Vancouver Island. The table below shows the social impact focus of these enterprises. The scan found that most social enterprises on Vancouver Island have an environmental focus. The second largest area of focus is food, followed by social purpose. The mapping found that few social enterprise focus on employment and training for persons facing barriers to employment. The report notes that over half of social enterprises across the Province of BC have an employment or training focus, compared with only 10 % of social enterprises on Vancouver Island. Given that many social procurement policies, frameworks and action plans among anchor institutions identified in this scan include a focus on employment and training opportunities for vulnerable populations, this represents a potential missed opportunity for social enterprise on Vancouver Island.

$87.70

$121.00 *

$94.50

…

$14.6

$129.3

$267.2

$373.3

$745.6

0 200 400 600 800

Non-profit

Higher Ed

Private

LocalGovernment

Public Hospitalsand Schools

Social Procurement Total operating $

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*Source: VISIZ 2015 Assets and Gaps mapping

3.3 Aboriginal-owned businesses

BC Hydro has a procurement strategy that includes the use of direct awards, competitive procurements and set asides to create procurement opportunities for aboriginal businesses. In some cases, BC Hydro also incorporates specific Aboriginal contract and supplier participation requirements in its contracts. In one example, Aboriginal contractors are providing site preparation services for the construction of a generating facility in Fort Nelson. To help facilitate these business relationships between large contractors and aboriginal businesses, BC Hydro hosts networking events.32

3.2 Traditional business Traditional businesses – business without an explicit social purpose - can also supply social benefits to anchor institutions and their communities. For example, some businesses hire and train vulnerable populations and pay a living wage. Some businesses also integrate social enterprise into their own supply chains and intentionally seek to provide goods and services to under-served markets. It can be difficult to identify businesses that generate social and community benefits, since these businesses lack an explicitly stated social purpose. Moreover, corporate social responsibility is sometimes confused with corporate social innovation. Most businesses have an established a corporate social responsibility (CSR) program, which responds to concerns among stakeholders including investors, employees, customers and community members related to reputational risk and litigation. Contracting with or purchasing from a company that has a CSR policy is not sufficient to qualify as social procurement. For example, committing to using green products for cleaning or demonstrating respect for labour rights does not mean that the company is creating positive social impact. It may be operating with sustainable principles and avoiding litigation or reputation risks. But it is not generating positive impacts for communities. To qualify as a potential supplier under a social procurement policy or framework, the business must have an explicit intention to generate positive social, environmental and/or economic benefits. An example is a construction company that commits to hiring and training individuals with disabilities that face employment barriers. In some cases, businesses may not have the skills, connections and resources to deliver these social benefits. This presents an opportunity for partnership between the private sector and social enterprise/non-profits, and strategies to support these types of partnerships should be explored.

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Drawing on media publications and interviews, this scan identified some examples of traditional businesses on Vancouver Island that could supply social benefits to anchor institutions. This is not a comprehensive list. The scan identified two industries where business on Vancouver Island are engaged in social innovations that intentionally seek positive benefits on their communities.

Construction companies

Like many urban centres across Canada, the City of Victoria has recently experienced an influx of refugees. Employment is an important milestone for refugees in achieving autonomy and economic well-being. Refugees and other vulnerable migrant populations face a range of barriers to employment, including language barriers, discrimination, lack of credentials to work in Canada and oftentimes, mental health challenges. A Vancouver Island construction company - Parker Johnston Construction – has provided training, tools, and credentials in Construction Safety and Metal Roofing for 14 Syrian refugees.33 “In light of a shrinking workforce, this is a good strategy for Parker Johnston; it provides a welcoming start in Canada for the refugees and helps build a more inclusive society. However, it currently means nothing when Parker Johnston bids on a public- sector contract.”34

A second example of an innovative construction company that is creating employment opportunities for marginalized populations on Vancouver Island is Big Island Services. The construction company has a targeted program that provides persons with disabilities with meaningful source of employment. The company accommodates individuals with hearing impairments, persons with injuries that prevent them from working shifts longer than a couple of hours at a time and for non-site specific such as design, allows employees to work from home. Big Island Services has worked with the Work-Ability program and vocational rehabilitation. “Not only does it have a positive impact on individuals in terms of his or her own confidence and self-sufficiency but it also teaches inclusion to our other employees.”35

Information technology companies

Information technology service providers often employ large numbers of workers for basic administrative and IT services to their clients. One company that Vancity contracts with specializes in supporting and employing persons along the autism spectrum. These individuals often have neuro-diverse abilities yet they face barriers to employment. Vancity has a contract worth over $1 million with the company. Another example is a contract worth approximately $500,000 to install computer hardware to refresh personal computers at Vancity branch offices. The organization that won this bid hired individuals from indigenous populations. The contract included a living wage requirement for the service provider. While Vancity recognizes that it is spending more because of the living wage requirement, it is also delivering social value that allows the whole community to prosper.

“Social procurement requires looking beyond the individual transaction to a longer-term and more holistic view of conducting business, and because of this approach, we succeed financially as well as delivering social impact. We know we will have ripple effects throughout the community because the increased cost of purchasing from companies that pay a living wage will, in turn, be spent in local communities.” – Hamed Pourchi, Vancity Savings Credit Union

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4 Barriers to Social Procurement

Drawing on literature, survey responses and interviews with key informants, this section identifies the most commonly referenced barriers to social enterprises accessing these opportunities. Barriers are organized across three sets of actors: demand-side (anchor institutions); supply-side (suppliers/service providers) and intermediaries that contribute to the broader enabling environment. Each set of actors can face three types of barriers: (1) resource constraints (2) perception barriers and; (3) institutional barriers.

4.1 Barriers among demand-side actors: The demand-side refers to the people, processes and structures that are internal to the anchor institutions. Interest in and commitment to social procurement is growing among anchor institutions on Vancouver Island. But there are limited examples of social procurement policies and frameworks applied to contracting or purchasing from social enterprise, which suggests that barriers to implementation remain high. The following describes some of the most common barriers on the demand side, drawing from the literature, interviews and survey responses. Resource barriers: Social procurement is a new concept for many anchor institutions and local governments. As such, it can take considerable staff time to learn about the concept and its relevance for their organization. The survey conducted for this research found that many respondents confuse social procurement with sustainable procurement. Sustainable procurement tends to focus more on mitigating downside risks associated with reputation and litigation than generating positive impacts. Most anchors have decentralized procurement systems, which means that staff across the entire organization must be educated and trained. Vancity Savings Credit Union for example has over 1100 vendors and staff across the organization are responsible for ensuring purchasing for under-threshold goods and services aligns with the credit union’s ethical principles. Oftentimes, a pilot is proposed as a first step to test initial ideas and assumptions. But pilots themselves require resources and time to implement and measure outcomes.36 For those anchor institutions that have adopted social procurement policies and frameworks, it takes significant staff time and resources to identify and engage with potential suppliers. If social procurement is not made a priority among senior leadership, staff may also face competing pressures from other and more immediate priorities. Perception barriers: A commonly cited barriers in the literature and the survey conducted for this research is the belief that social procurement requires a trade-off between financial value and social value. However, some interviewees suggest that once governments look across all areas of their spending and transcend their tendency to think in silos, they will identify opportunities to create new value and reduce costs. The ability to look at procurement in this way requires strong leadership. Another common perception is that anchor institutions are prohibited from contracting based on social criteria by trade agreements.37 Institutional barriers: Procurement of over-threshold goods and services is subject to rigorous regulation and oversight. Given the size and accountability mechanisms of anchor institutions, changes to procurement processes may require changes in institutional policies, rules, norms and culture that can take significant coordination and time to achieve. For example, to achieve cost efficiencies, procurement officials often use large, bundled contracts, which require contractors to supply a range of products and services. This often prohibits SMEs and social enterprise from competing for direct contract opportunities

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since they lack the capacity to deliver goods and services on such a scale. Many anchors also participate in joint-purchasing arrangements to receive volume discounts. Again, these arrangements tend to exclude smaller suppliers and social enterprise from directly competing for opportunities. Institutional buyers also often delegate purchasing decisions for some goods and services to an external contract manager through multi-year contract. This can also present challenges as the anchor institution relinquishes control over specific purchasing decisions. Moreover, the profit motivation of the contracted food service provider means they will have a strong bias toward keeping costs low in the short-term.38 The lack of standards for evaluating social value also presents a challenge. As one city procurement manager describes the landscape, “procurement is a bit like a minefield and we don’t want to add more mines to the field. Having standardized evaluation criteria for social procurement and community benefit is important to reduce the risks of being challenged under trade agreements or procurement law.” Interviewees also emphasized the need for a cultural shift in public-sector procurement and purchasing.

4.2 Barriers among supply-side actors Supply-side actors refer to the contractors and service providers that have the potential to supply social benefits. The following barriers for social enterprises are identified below, drawing on literature, interviews and survey responses. This research is limited in that interviews were only conducted with demand-side actors and intermediaries. Future research should engage with social enterprise to understand their perspective and experiences. Resource barriers: A significant barrier facing social enterprise is the lack of staff – including sales force, and persons that can perform administrative tasks required to sell goods and services to institutional buyers. This is a challenge, even among those institutional buyers that are actively seeking opportunities to diversify their supply chains and create more opportunities for smaller suppliers and social enterprise. As one private sector procurement manager explains, “for fairness and transparency, we follow a standard procedure and it can sometimes mean a fair amount of work for proponents in responding to our RFPs and not all proponents have the resources and time; it is a substantive cost for them.”39 Another challenge identified in the interviews is the lack of financial resources. Some interviewees were concerned that a small supplier or social enterprise may not have the capacity to deliver the goods or services on time, or at all. Social enterprise and other small suppliers also often face cash flow challenges and delayed payments can present significant barriers to contracting or selling to institutional buyers. Perception barriers: Some contractors may be unwilling to integrate social enterprise into their supply chain through sub-contracting due to a perception that they are unreliable. For example, a recent evaluation of the Scottish community benefits requirements finds that contractors “found it difficult to get good quality, competitive tenders from social enterprise.”40 More research is needed to understand the willingness of contractors on Vancouver Island to sub-contract opportunities to social enterprise. Institutional barriers: A recent evaluation of institutional food systems funded by the J.W. McConnell Foundation found that “as institutional procurement is increasingly conducted through large and centralized group purchasing, there is little financial incentive for smaller produce farmers to navigate the complex procurement bureaucracies, or to achieve the required CanadaGAP certification sell to institutional markets.”41 Other institutional barriers on the supply-side include lack of intermediaries such as supplier consortiums to negotiate on behalf of suppliers for better terms.

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4.3 Barriers in the ecosystem In absence of a healthy ecosystem to support social enterprise, social procurement will remain a limited tool to strengthen social enterprise on Vancouver Island. Intermediaries and institutions that are required to facilitate matching between demand and supply include standards and contracting norms, networks, consultants, investors and capacity-building supports, among others. Resource barriers: Matching supply with demand in any new market with high barriers to information and lack of contracting standards and norms often requires intermediaries to facilitate the exchange. Intermediaries can be organizations such as capacity-building funds, consultancies, investors, networks and associations that facilitate transactions by providing public goods and standardized information and often resolve some collective action problem. But intermediaries themselves require capacity and access to sustained resources and support to fulfill these functions.42 Perception barriers: There is a risk that social procurement is viewed as a silver bullet for strengthening the social enterprise sector and addressing social problems. As the Community Social Planning Council has argued, “procurement is only one aspect on a continuum of practices that include joint needs identification, service planning and contract design, the procurement process itself, and appropriate service monitoring and reporting tools that feed back into needs identification and planning.” 43 Moreover, in absence of capacity-building supports and increased supply of blended finance to help social enterprise to achieve the scale needed to serve some institutional markets, social procurement will remain a limited tool for strengthening the social enterprise sector on Vancouver Island. Institutional barriers: Context is key to understanding the potential to adapt social innovations to new environments. “Vancouver Island is not Toronto or Vancouver; we do not have a social enterprise sector nor do we have the large number of diversity suppliers that can found in cities like Toronto.”44 Some interviewees also noted that Vancouver Island lacks a coordinated landscape of intermediaries that are focused on social procurement. Moreover, Canada lags other jurisdictions such as Australia, the European Union, the United Kingdom and United States that have implemented enabling legislation and policy reforms to support social procurement. While Prime Minister Justin Trudeau included social procurement in his mandate letter to the Minister of Public Services and Procurement, Canada has yet to implement enabling policy and legislation that would advance social procurement in a meaningful way.

5 Opportunities and Recommendations Transcending barriers to social procurement will require long-term commitments among anchor institution leaders, changes in internal policies and procedures, sustained and coordinated social enterprise capacity building supports, and strong cross-sector collaboration between anchor institutions, contractors, social enterprise and intermediaries. Success will also require an enabling policy environment and new ways of thinking across government. Drawing on literature, interviews with key informants and survey responses, the section below recommends strategies for overcoming barriers and highlights the opportunities for advancing social procurement opportunities for social enterprise on Vancouver Island.

5.1 Innovate Procurement Practices Several opportunities for innovation in anchor institutions procurement practices were identified in the literature review and interviews. Change in the procurement process must begin with policy-level

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support. In absence of buy-in from senior leadership, one interviewee warns that the procurement process will remain an administrative rather than a strategic function.45 Most interviewees agreed that political leadership is essential to signal to staff that social procurement is a priority. Assuming political leadership is secured, the following section identifies strategies used by some anchor institutions to improve alignment between policy objectives and procurement processes and to introduce greater diversity in their supply chains, including creating opportunities for social enterprise. Contract bundling and size: Most experts agree that institutional buyers should consider opportunities for unbundling contracts to allow a more diverse range of suppliers and providers to bid on contract opportunities.46 It is, however, important to recognize that in some cases, bundled contracts provide cost efficiencies. Some interviewees noted that it is possible to balance cost efficiency associated with bundling and/or size of contracts with accessibility. The Village of Cumberland contracts with a social enterprise to deliver a portion of its shredding services, while also contracting with a larger service provider that has the capacity to handle larger volumes. The Village has a larger contract with a street litter removal program run by the Beaufort Association for the Mentally Handicap. Engage with large suppliers: In cases where smaller contract size is not feasible or desirable, anchor institutions and local governments can engage with large proponents to encourage and even require them to embed social benefits and to create sub-contract opportunities for social enterprise. Many institutions contract a food service management company. While this is often viewed as a barrier to introducing social benefit criteria, in a recent report, the J.W. McConnell Foundation (2017) suggests that anchor institutions can ask their service providers to benchmark progress and report on how they integrate social benefits into their supply chain. At least every two years, Vancity procurement staff discuss with their strategic suppliers the credit union’s ethical principles, and explain how these principles apply to its procurement and relationship with suppliers. While Vancity does not require suppliers to adopt their values, it does see this engagement as instrumental in raising awareness around social issues.

“It is amazing how many vendors did not know about this initiative [living wage] before being engaged in our bid process. These vendors became living wage employers and are now encouraging their own vendors to pay a living wage. We are creating awareness in the market through our procurement process.” – Hamed Pourchi, Vancity Savings Credit Union

Engage with small/diversity suppliers: Most interviewees emphasized the importance of supporting and educating small suppliers about the procurement process. Vancity Savings Credit Union has developed a toolkit that it uses to engage with potential providers and suppliers. The toolkit includes a self-assessment framework for potential contractors to help them to articulate their social impact. One interviewee noted that there is opportunity for assisting aboriginal businesses to better understand the procurement process and to work with potential suppliers to improve their capacity to compete for contract opportunities. However, most interviewees also noted that this engagement requires significant resources and staff time. Engagement with suppliers is often easier for smaller anchor institutions that can make direct contact with their vendors. For example, the Village of Cumberland surveyed its local vendor community to find out what the impact on suppliers would be if the Village adopted GMO-free food purchasing requirements. The Village directly contacted many vendors by telephone. The feedback was used to inform the Village’s approach to adopting softer language that recognizes that in some instances vendors may not have information about their supply chain or it would be prohibitively costly to obtain this information.

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Innovate Contract Bid Process and Design: The BC Provincial Government is taking significant steps to simplify and streamline its RFP process. In 2013, the Province of BC has developed a Short-Form RFP to make it easier for small businesses to bid on contract opportunities (for goods and services < $250,000). The RFP templates were developed with extensive consultation with stakeholders and staff. The intended impacts of the new form are to “reduce the time that it requires to manage the RFP process and to establish better alignment between evaluation criteria and what is requested of bidders.”47 Innovations in how contracts are designed are also helping more social enterprise and small business to successfully compete for opportunities. For example, North Island College FEED Comox Valley demonstrated that in the context of local food procurement “Grow to order” contracts could be used by anchors to source local food on a cost-neutral basis, while providing stability of demand for the next generation of farmers and stability of supply for anchors. In doing so, futures contracts allow smaller suppliers and producers to scale and to secure the financing needed to expand their business.48 Forward Contracting with Grow to Order Contracts

“There are 2,000 farms on Vancouver Island, but only 9 qualify to supply Island Health (the Health Authority for Vancouver Island and several neighboring communities). With the exception of milk, few, if any, actually do any sales, primarily due to the large bundled contracts of institutions. “Grow to order” contracts with institutions like colleges and hospitals offer stability of demand providing important and secure markets for the next generation of farmers, revitalizing local agriculture and economies and reestablishing the island’s ability to produce its own food.” Sandra Hamilton, Social Innovator and Project Lead, FEED Comox Valley Local Food Initiative Source: McConnell Report, 2017, pg. 15

Identify new suppliers: Another area of the procurement process that requires innovation relates to how anchor institutions and local governments communicate and learn about opportunities to contract with smaller suppliers and social enterprise to ensure diversity in their supply chain. The difficulty of finding new suppliers, and in particular social enterprises that can meet an anchor’s demand, was identified as a significant barrier by most interviewees. The following strategies are examples of how some anchor institutions on Vancouver Island and elsewhere are addressing this barrier:

Direct engagement: For those anchor institutions that have the resources and are not constrained by corporate purchasing contracts with large suppliers, they can engage directly with local suppliers and producers to better understand and verify social benefits. For example, the University of Victoria has considerable flexibility in its food services because it is not subject to a corporate food service management contract.49 As a result, “the University’s Food Services staff can establish direct relationships and engage in capacity building with local farmers and food producers to enable them to become regular suppliers to the university.”50 Vancity Savings Credit Union often considers its own business members, many of whom are social enterprise, to identify potential suppliers that align with the credit union’s values. Due to its relatively small size, Cumberland is often able to establish direct relationships with its vendors and to teach potential proponents how to become vendors for the Village.

Reverse Trade-shows: A reverse trade show provides an opportunity for organizations with procurement needs to engage with new and diverse suppliers, including social enterprise and ventures. Such an event can also provide anchor institutions to advertise their own procurement opportunities. Social enterprise and ventures can directly engage with contracting authorities and

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gain valuable information to help them in preparing successful proposals. This type of engagement also provides new and diverse suppliers with sufficient time to prepare their bids, and to collaborate with other suppliers. The Province of Nova Scotia hosts an annual reverse trade show for its suppliers. On-line registries and directories: Another strategy that is used by some anchor institutions to identify social benefit suppliers is an on-line database. Databases are an efficient way to provide contact information and facilitate direct matching, making it easy for contracting authorities to identify potential suppliers. The City of Victoria encourages social enterprises and other suppliers to sign up for email alerts about procurement opportunities. BC Hydro has created a directory for aboriginal vendors. Vendors are encouraged to register and non-aboriginal businesses are encouraged to explore the directory to identify opportunities for partnership or subcontractors.51 Cumberland and the City of Victoria also have on-line notification of contract opportunities and recommends that social enterprise sign up to find relevant opportunities. Cumberland encourages contractors to post sub-contract opportunities on its website. Interviewees emphasized the importance of ensuring this information is provided in a central place that is easy for buyers to navigate. Certification: Some procurement managers suggested that a significant barrier to purchasing goods and services from social enterprise is that they do not know how to identify them. Interviewees emphasized the importance of market-building initiatives such as certification for social buyers and service providers/suppliers. Buy Social Canada provides certification to help buyers and sellers to build their brand awareness as social purchasers and social suppliers.

Figure 2: Buy Social Guidelines for Certification: (for suppliers) https://www.buysocialcanada.com

• At least 50% of your business’ revenue comes from selling goods/services in the marketplace • You have an embedded social, environmental or cultural mission as a part of your organization • 50% or more of your profits go back into executing your mission’s purpose • Your business operates with transparency and responsibility • Documentation that demonstrates your business’ social impact history (e.g. incorporation

documents, financial reports, etc.) • Ability to pay Buy Social’s annual certification fee (to cover resources, consulting, and support)

based on your business’ revenue

5.2 Build Capacity for Measuring and Evaluating Social Benefits Contracting authorities must be able to measure, evaluate and report on social benefits to ensure that meaningful impacts are being achieved for communities, social enterprise and ventures and individuals.52 In most cases, the onus for measurement is placed on the contractor to explain and report on how they are achieving social benefits. Some organizations use a self-assessment tool to help proponents to evaluate social benefits. Interviewees emphasized that it is important that staff across the organization understand how to measure and evaluate the potential and realized social impacts of their purchasing decisions. Interviewees also emphasized that standard measures are needed to ensure consistency in application of

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community and social benefit criteria and are key to maintaining a fair and transparent procurement process. At the same time, some interviewees highlighted the importance of flexible and proportionate measurement and evaluation approaches to ensure diverse suppliers can participate and to encourage innovative responses from proponents.53 The section below highlights some examples of how anchors are beginning to measure and evaluate social value and impacts. Some institutional buyers have made progress toward benchmarking and auditing food purchasing. The District of Saanich requires all its suppliers to “report to the Purchasing Department at least annually on the percentage of local food that is delivered to the municipality food vendors/sites relative to overall food purchases.” In its annual AASHE report, the University of Victoria states that it “has a goal to benchmark and increase the number of local food producers and suppliers and to maintain an active preference for Island produced products.” The University also reports that it is conducting an inventory of the University’s food supply chain. The review includes for each food and beverage product, indicating: the description/type; label, brand or producer; and the category in which it is being counted and/or a description of its sustainability attributes.54 BC Hydro requires that its contractors to report on how they are supporting aboriginal participation. For example, in a recent RFP, BC Hydro requires that suppliers will “submit to Hydro’s Representative a report of the Aboriginal Participation measures or benefits, if any, implemented or provided by Consultant to date in connection with the Services, setting out the type and quantity of such measures and benefits and the identity of the beneficiaries.” The RFP also requires regular meetings with BC Hydro representative to review the contractor’s Aboriginal Participation plan and to benchmark their performance.55 Vancity has developed a toolkit for businesses and employees engaged in procurement and purchasing decisions “to help them make community mindful decisions that are aligned with Vancity’s ethical principles.” The toolkit includes a set of comprehensive questions for Vancity staff to evaluate potential vendors and to better understand the social value that potential vendors are creating (see Figure 3). The toolkit also provides a self-assessment for vendors. Vancity also conducts a review with its strategic suppliers every two years. During the review process, the credit union shares with its vendors the organization’s guiding principles to create awareness around social issues such and it is the hope that the vendor will follow their lead. “It is not mandatory, as we do not want to impose our values on anyone, but we do advocate for a living wage through our procurement process.” Vendors are also asked to answer some questions to demonstrate alignment with Vancity’s principles, such as how they are taking steps to generate positive social impact through their policies, programs or examples of social impacts. Figure 3: Assessment Criteria

Example of Vancity Assessment Criteria for Staff:

Provide reasoning for the assessment of alignment above: If poorly or ambiguously aligned, are there alternative suppliers that we could utilize?

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How does this organization’s alignment and performance compare to other operators in this particular industry? How much influence would the organization have over Vancity?

Local governments on Vancouver Island are working on a standardized approach to measuring and evaluation community benefit in infrastructure contracts. Sandra Hamilton, a social procurement expert is leading a pilot project to establish a standardized approach to community benefit infrastructure with three municipalities and the Vancouver Island Construction Association. “The project involves identifying an infrastructure project in each of the three Vancouver Island municipalities; providing education in each municipality; working collaboratively with public owners, identifying the key intermediary organizations that can work to overcome the barriers and facilitate cross-sector partnerships; working to build consensus and support for an industry-supported and standardized approach with all three municipalities; and, conducting the procurement process, reporting the findings and developing a standard of practice for community benefit infrastructure.”56 It is anticipated that the pilot will include a menu of community benefit options from which to choose. Procurement managers participating in the pilot see this as an opportunity to standardize criteria and introduce greater transparency into contracting, while still allowing for some flexibility to ensure that community benefits align with their own policy objectives.57 The City of Victoria will be testing the criteria in a tender to better understand how proponents will respond to these opportunities. The pilot community benefit criteria would not be evaluated on the initial tender. “The questions we will be looking at include would a firm be able to actually bid on these opportunities, how would it affect price, and what extra work would be required for the firm to provide social benefits?”58 When the City is comfortable with the answers to these questions, it is anticipated that they would go to market. “It is important that the City gets this right before going to tender. We don’t want to first go out and end up in a court battle and create a negative view of community benefit infrastructure because we did not get it right the first time.”59

The Village of Cumberland has direct experience with integrating social and community benefit criteria across a variety of expenditures. In the absence of widely agreed standards and tools for measuring and evaluating social impacts, the Village uses a pragmatic approach to monitoring contracts. In the pre-tendering stage, the Village provides guidelines and priorities but leaves the task of specifying the social benefits up to the proponent.

“When we leave it up to the vendor to look at the Village’s social procurement framework goals and strategic priorities, they are able to come up with great ideas on their own, without us telling them how to do it. They know their business better than anyone. Giving contractors the option to explain how they can make a social impact to the Village allows them to decide what impacts best align with their business model.” – Michelle Mason, CFO, Village of Cumberland

5.3 Build Social Enterprise Capacity

Most interviewees expressed that they do not have the capacity to undertake market-building initiatives on their own. Social procurement requires a robust market of intermediaries to serve as a link between communities, suppliers and anchor institutions/local governments. Intermediaries play several important roles in the market for social procurement, including training and capacity building among social

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enterprises, educating contracting authorities, third-party certification (i.e. Buy Social Canada) advising senior management and political leaders about social procurement opportunities, and facilitating opportunities for pooling resources among anchor institutions and marketing, among several other supports.60 Most interviewees suggested that one of the most important roles intermediaries can play to help advance social procurement opportunities on Vancouver Island to help build social enterprise build capacity through training, education, financial support (blended capital to improve their financial position) and training on how to communicate their social impacts to potential buyers. Another common response was to help build awareness of social enterprise. If buyers are not aware of the opportunities, they will not be able to design an RFP with these suppliers in mind. Investment and Contract Readiness Fund

The UK Investment and Contract Readiness Fund was established to address challenges facing social enterprise and charities that lack the experience and resources to compete for public sector contracts. The Fund distributed partially repayable grants between £50,000 to £150,000 to social ventures that bid on contracts up to £1 million or seeking to raise investment capital. Funds could be used by recipients to hire consultants and other specialists to assist with readiness to bid on contract or attract investment. An evaluation of the ICRF finds that 155 social sector organizations have received funding from ICRF, and 78 of these organizations have secured private investment or contracts. As a result of the program support, £79 M of private investment has been unlocked and £154 M of contracts have been granted to social purpose enterprise and charities in the UK.61

Intermediaries take on several organizational forms such as civil society organizations, social purchasing groups, consultancies, investors, workforce development networks among others. Interviewees suggested greater collaboration and coordination between intermediaries and more support to sustain their efforts are needed to ensure social enterprise benefit from emerging social procurement opportunities on Vancouver Island (Annex C).62 When asked what is needed to advance social procurement on Vancouver Island, one interviewee responded, “to succeed, Vancouver Island needs a shared vision [for social procurement] among all intermediaries working in this space that is grounded in community.” Most interviewees also emphasized the importance of a cultural change on the demand-side to lead the way. In absence of demand, social enterprises will not have a market opportunity to which they can respond. “The potential [of social procurement to strengthen social enterprise ecosystem] is unlimited. When you look at the products and services that businesses buy – building, maintenance, catering, courier services, landscaping – the list goes on – there is no limit to social enterprise operating any of these businesses, so long as there is demand to purchase these from social enterprise.”63

5.4 Toward an Enabling Policy Environment While it is beyond the scope of this report to consider and evaluate public policy options to support the advancement of social procurement and social enterprise/venture development, several opportunities emerged from the literature and key informant interviews that should be explored further. At the national level, there are several promising signs that policy makers in Canada are beginning to recognize the power of social procurement to improve alignment between procurement processes and broader policy objectives. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s inclusion of social procurement in his mandate letter is one promising sign.

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At the provincial level, Manitoba, Nova Scotia, Ontario and Quebec are advancing policy initiatives that have the potential to provide greater legitimacy and for adopting social procurement policies.64 The Ontario Government has contributed financial support to the Social Purchasing Project, tasked with assisting social enterprises to bid on government contracts. Nova Scotia’s Community Economic Development Investment Funds have long been the envy of social sector advocates in other provinces to incentivize investment in local businesses. In British Columbia, the Province has adopted Social Impact Purchasing Guidelines for the Ministry of Social Development and Social Innovation. Some interviewees mentioned that these Guidelines have helped to raise awareness in their own organization around social procurement. The enabling framework for community contribution companies introduced by the BC Government is another promising development. In 2016, the Association of Vancouver Island and Coastal Communities passed a resolution proposed by the Village of Cumberland in favour of exploring social procurement and advocating for changes to the Local Government Act and the Community Charter. Since the passing of the resolution, a Mayor’s Group has been established and has been meeting quarterly to discuss how to advance social procurement on Vancouver Island. The Mayor’s group is currently working to secure financing to develop a business plan for a Community Benefit Hub.

6 Conclusion Realizing the full potential of social procurement on Vancouver Island will yield significant efficiencies and cost savings for anchor institutions and local governments that are already working to address complex social policy demands related to youth and aboriginal employment, health, poverty alleviation and economic development, among several other priorities. At the same time, social procurement provides opportunities to significantly strengthen social enterprises and ventures on Vancouver Island. If anchor institutions and local governments committed to ensuring just 5% of their total contracts and purchasing were directed toward contract and sub-contract opportunities for social enterprise, this could make a substantial contribution to strengthening the social enterprise ecosystem on Vancouver Island. Looking forward, if the City of Victoria’s bid to host the Commonwealth Games in 2022 is successful, this could generate significant opportunities to leverage federal, provincial and local government dollars to experiment with and accelerate opportunities for purchasing from social enterprise and ventures.65 In absence of supports to build their internal capacity and profile, social enterprises and ventures on Vancouver Island are at risk of being excluded from these opportunities. While actors on the demand-side must do their part to ensure that their contract opportunities are accessible to a more diverse range of contractors, social enterprise and intermediaries must also ensure that they are prepared to respond to these emerging opportunities. Interviewees emphasized the importance of ensuring that staff are educated about the procurement process, properly resourced to dedicate time to bidding on opportunities and are able to clearly articulate their social impact to potential buyers. Coordinated effort across public and private sector actors is needed to build the capacity of social enterprise to effectively respond to the emerging social procurement opportunities on Vancouver Island.

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Resources AASHE 2017 University of Victoria Scorecard, Available at: https://stars.aashe.org/institutions/university-of-victoria-bc/report/ Accelerating Social Impact 2014 Primer on Trade Agreements for Social Purchasing. Available at: Atkinson Foundation (2016) Community Benefits and Social Procurement Policies: A Jurisdictional Review. Available at: http://atkinsonfoundation.ca/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/mowat-af_cb-spp_review_final.pdf City of Courtenay Council Meeting Minutes December 19, 2016 City of Victoria The Mayor’s Taskforce on Social Enterprise and Social Procurement Action Plan. Available at: https://ccednet-rcdec.ca/sites/ccednet-rcdec.ca/files/sesp_action_plan_e.pdf Columbia Institute 2014 Buying Local: Tools for Forward-Thinking Institutions. Available at; http://www.sauder.ubc.ca/Faculty/Research_Centres/Centre_for_Social_Innovation_and_Impact_Investin

g/Research/Social_Innovation/~/media/Files/ISIS/Reports/Social%20Economy%20Reports/Buying%20L

ocal%20-%20Tools%20for%20Forward%20Thinking%20%20Institutions.ashx

Community Social Planning Council 2012 Toward a Community Benefit Model of Procurement in Community Services. Available at: http://www.communitycouncil.ca/sites/default/files/CSPC_Report_Community_Benefit_Procurement_m

odel_2013January.pdf Hamilton, S. 2014. Social Procurement - The Olympic, Commonwealth & Pan Am Games, and the growing case for Social Procurement Policy in Canada http://www.sandrahamilton.ca/assets/uploads/sandra_hamilton__social_procurement_july_2014_web_59814.pdf Hamilton, S. 2016. Social Innovation Public Policy. Advancing Social Innovation in Canada. Available at: http://www.sandrahamilton.ca/assets/uploads/sandra_hamilton__avicc_public_policy__web_59814.pdf Hamilton, S. 2016. People, planet and profit. Brining focus back to the people. Available at: http://www.sandrahamilton.ca/assets/uploads/northworks_mag_2017__social_procurement_in_infrastructure_59814.pdf Hamilton, S. 2017. People, Planet and Profit. Available at: http://www.nrca.ca/media/Northworks_2017_Web.pdf. See page 30-31. Hebb, T. and Hachigian, H. 2017 Carleton Centre for Community Innovation 2017 Social Procurement Measurement and Evaluation Frameworks and Toolkits. ICIC and Prudential Foundation (2014) Creating an Anchored Local Economy in Newark Recommendations for Implementing a Comprehensive Local Procurement Strategy http://icic.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/ICIC_NEWARK_rprt_REV.pdf

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Lepage, D. 2014. Exploring Social Procurement. Available at: https://ccednet-rcdec.ca/sites/ccednet-rcdec.ca/files/ccednet/exploring-social-procurement_asi-ccc-report.pdf Learning Enrichment Foundation 2015 The Social Procurement Intermediary. Available at: http://www.lefca.org/documents/Social-Procurement-Intermediary-LEF-2015.pdf McConnell Family Foundation 2017 Food Secure Canada Report Available at:

https://foodsecurecanada.org/sites/foodsecurecanada.org/files/purchasing_power_report2017.pdf Mowat Centre and Atkinson Foundation Report 2015 The Prosperous Province: Strategies for Building Community Wealth. Available at: http://anchorinstitutions.ca/ Ministry of Social Development and Social Innovation Social Procurement Guidelines. http://www2.gov.bc.ca/assets/gov/employment-business-and-economic-development/business-management/social-innovation/si-purchasing-guidelines.pdf Town of Ladysmith Council Meeting Minutes February 2017. UN Environment Program (2017) Global Review of Sustainable Public Procurement https://reeveconsulting.files.wordpress.com/2017/06/final-unep-globalreview_web.pdf VISIZ (2015) Vancouver Island Assets for Social Enterprise, Social Innovation and Social Finance: Mapping, Discussion and Gaps Analysis. http://visocialinnovation.ca/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/VISIZ-Assets-and-Gaps-August-2016-1.pdf .

Interviews The researcher is grateful to the following interviewees for sharing their ideas, knowledge and experiences. Any errors or omissions are the sole responsibility of the author. Jim Dempsey, Vancouver Island Health Authority Sandra Hamilton, Sandra Hamilton Consulting Keith Hennessey, Procurement Manager, City of Victoria Andrew Hoelton, Ready to Rent (previously Community Social Planning Council) Mike Lachocki, Senior Manager Supply Chain, BC Housing David LePage, Accelerating Social Innovation Michelle Mason, CFO, Village of Cumberland Hamed Pourchi, Vancity Savings Credit Union Naomi Tabata, Director, CARTI, North Island College

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Appendix A: Anchors with Social Procurement Policies, Frameworks, Guidelines or Action Plans

Anchor

Institution

Policy Scope Goods and

Services ($)

Link

BC Housing Certified Buy Social

Potentially applies

to all relevant

areas

BC Hydro

“To support the long term economic interests of Aboriginal

peoples, we're committed to directing procurement

opportunities for the benefit of local First Nation communities

in support of our impact benefit agreements, relationship

agreements, or other arrangements with Aboriginal

communities.

Aboriginal

businesses –

(policy applies to

all relevant areas)

Aboriginal

Procurement

Policy

City of Victoria

“Procurement to weigh, on a case-by-case basis, innovation,

social value, value for money, and employment creation for

people currently on the margins of the economy.”

$48.3 M

(Anticipated that

policy will apply

to all areas)

Social

Procurement

Action Plan

(2017)

District of

Saanich

“When practical, both operationally and economically, 40%

of purchases shall be local.”

Local Food

Local Food

Procurement

Policy (2012)

District 85,

Vancouver

Island North

School District

Local preference (If price, and the ability to meet the above

requirements are equal or nearly equal, a supplier may be

chosen based on how well it meets the following

requirements: a) Supplier location (local, B.C. and then

Canadian suppliers may be given preference, in that order); b)

Uniformity or standardization with existing products or

services; and c) Past record in previous dealings with supplier

(references, reputation).

(Policy applies to

all spending)

Purchasing Policy

(2009)

Ministry of

Social

Development

and Social

Innovation

“The guidelines require ministry staff to consider social

value, in addition to financial value, when they are procuring

goods and services.”

Security services,

local food

See link to

guidelines (2015)

Town of

Qualicum

Beach

“The Social Procurement Policy seeks to proactively leverage

the supply chain to achieve positive community objectives.”

Policy applies to

all relevant areas

Social

Procurement

Policy (2016)

University of

Victoria

"Sustainability Activities will require the balanced use of

resources within budgetary parameters and will utilize life

cycle assessment and purchasing practices based on Social,

Environmental and Financial considerations.”

$78 M (All major

purchasing

decisions are

made using a

triple bottom line

decision making

framework

(AASHE 2017).

Sustainability Plan

(2014) and

Sustainability

Policy (2017)

Vancity Savings

Credit Union

“Our procurement policy favours relationships with suppliers

who demonstrate leadership in sustainable business practices.

We include social and environmental criteria in our request

for proposal process, including sourcing products and services

locally where possible.”

$121 M in 2016

spent on local

business (Applies

to all areas)

(see page X

Annual Report).

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30

Village of

Cumberland

“The Village of Cumberland uses a social procurement

framework to leverage public dollars and achieve desirable

and targeted social impact for the Village through competitive

bid and purchasing activities.” The Village seeks an

alignment of its Procurement Policy and Principles with its

commitment to social, environmental and economic

sustainability as defined in its Social Procurement

Framework. The expectation is that all organizations doing

business with the Village will meet or exceed environmental

standards, laws and regulations and ensure safe and healthy

places of work where human and civil rights are respected.”

(Applies to all

areas)

Social

Procurement

Framework and

First Certified Buy

Social

Municipality in

Canada

Appendix B: Pilot Initiatives/Exploring Social procurement

Pilot Description Theme Partners

North Island College

FEED Comox Pilot

Project

The project introduced farm-direct deliveries to the

North Island College (NIC), St. Joseph’s Hospital and

Glacier View Lodge. The project also worked with

Island Health to better understand the challenges faced

by the hospitals when trying to source local food.

Local Food

North Island College,

VIHA and Comox

Valley Regional

District

Camosun College

“Camosun aims to offer affordable and healthy food

services options which evaluate and minimize their

impact on the environment and local community. On

campus, students have a variety of food options,

offered by our food services partner Aramark, the

Professional Cook programs, and the student-run Farm

Box program.”

Local Food

18 – 20% of produce is

grown on Vancouver

Island.

72% of it is grown in

B.C.

90% of baked goods are

local.

Eggs are cage-free and

B.C. raised.

Milk and cream come

from Island suppliers.

focus on Canadian-

raised protein.

Vancouver Island

Infrastructure Pilot

“The project involves identifying an infrastructure

project in each of the three Vancouver Island

municipalities; providing education in each

municipality; industry working collaboratively with

public owners identifying the key intermediary

organizations that can work to overcome the barriers

and facilitate cross-sector partnerships; working to

build consensus and support for an industry-supported

and standardized approach with all three

municipalities; and, conducting the procurement

process, reporting the findings and developing a

standard of practice for community benefit

infrastructure.”

Infrastructure

City of Campbell River,

City of Victoria and

Town of Qualicum

Beach, Sandra

Hamilton Consulting

and Vancouver Island

Construction

Association

Considering Policy/Framework

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Ladysmith Not yet adopted but considering a policy as of 2016 – See Council Meeting Minutes

Campbell River Part of working group AVICC looking at social value procurement policy. Not yet

adopted but considering it. Municipality has had a green procurement policy since 2000.

Greater Victoria

Harbour Authority

“enter into new discussions with the Esquimalt Nation and the Songhees Nation, to

clarify and confirm an effective and affordable role for GVHA in local First Nations

economic development, capacity building and employment.”

Courtenay Not yet but considering – As of December 2016 - in Phase 2 pilot stage will involve the

implementation of a social procurement pilot project and the results of the project will be

identified in a subsequent report to Council.

Appendix C: AVICC Social Procurement Resolution

Table X: Examples of Intermediaries on Vancouver Island

Intermediary Type of Support Description/Examples

Vancouver Island and Coastal Communities Indigenous Food Network

Supply-side “collective of passionate and dedicated members with a shared vision of a healthy future based upon reconnecting with First Nations cultural teachings and practices. The membership is made up of culturally knowledgeable food harvesters and gatherers, health professionals, community development workers and members of the scientific community.”

Mayors Group Coordinated action among local governments, share best practices, lessons learned.

Resolution passed in 2016 to commit AVICC to advancing social procurement and encouraging provincial government to include social procurement in Part 6 (financial management) of the Community Charter and 11 of the Local Government Act. The working group is exploring the feasibility of a community benefit procurement hub.

Community Social Planning Council

Research and knowledge mobilization

Raise awareness around social procurement opportunities, living wage campaign, policy advocacy. In 2016, launched a social enterprise incubator.

Embers (Vancouver) Assist in measuring outcomes and impacts of social enterprise

Island Chef’s Collaborative (ICC)

Capacity building for local farmers and shared information among anchor institutions about opportunities

The ICC is a community based non-profit organization dedicated to a sustainable local food and agriculture system on Vancouver Island, and the Gulf Islands. The icc has recently partnered with FarmFolk CityFolk and VanCity to offer $100,000 in zero interest microloans to farmers and processors.

Island Coastal Trust Capacity building for social enterprise/non-profits

Grants could be used to support social procurement initiatives among anchor institutions

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NIC CARTI Incubation, knowledge mobilization

“CARTI helps businesses and communities harness the power of faculty experts, creative students and research funding. With the help of federally funded experts and industry partners, CARTI is developing new technology and aquaculture monitoring techniques, improving health care delivery methods, designing innovative bottling techniques for the wine industry and connecting local food producers to public institutions.”

Sandra Hamilton Consulting

Advisory services to governments, anchor institutions and industry; project leadership for demonstration/pilot projects; Conference keynotes and education

Canada’s First Social MBA & a leading Social Procurement Advisor located on VI - Former Business Manager to Vancouver 2010 CEO John Furlong; designer of both B.C.’s and Alberta’s first Social Procurement Frameworks. Advisor to City of Victoria, Town of Qualicum Beach, City of Campbell River, Village of Cumberland; Vancouver Island Construction Association and Regional Municipality of Wood Buffalo; Pilot lead: Community Benefit Infrastructure Pilot & NIC FEED Comox Valley Project.

Scale Collaborative Support for social enterprise/non-profits to scale

Hosts workshops/events on social procurement for non-profits/supply-side and capacity-building supports for contract readiness

SE Catalyst Social enterprise incubation/capacity supports

Series of events that support social enterprises. Cross-sector collaborative of many different partners located on and/or serving Vancouver Island.

Vancity Savings Credit Union (and other credit unions on the Island such as Coast Capital and Island Savings)

Investment capital, training, awareness raising

In addition to acting as an anchor institution with considerable purchasing power on Vancouver Island, Vancity Credit Union provides investment capital to social enterprise, financial services, and a wide range of other non-financial supports to social entrepreneurs, disadvantaged businesses, on Vancouver Island.

Vancouver Island Heritage Food Cooperative

Facilitate sourcing from local farmers on VI

Incubated by the University of Victoria.

Vancouver Island Construction Association

Industry representative Industry association and private-sector partner in community benefit infrastructure pilot project

Victoria Community Food Hub Society

Supply-side network Support development of sustainable local food system

Victoria Foundation Building capacity – supply-side Grant funding to build capacity

Vancouver Island Social Innovation Zone

Network Research and knowledge mobilization

*For a more comprehensive list of intermediaries on Vancouver Island, see: VISIZ (2015) Vancouver Island Assets for Social Enterprise, Social Innovation and Social Finance: Mapping, Discussion and Gaps Analysis. http://visocialinnovation.ca/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/VISIZ-Assets-and-Gaps-August-2016-1.pdf .

Notes

1 See: Lepage, D. 2014. Exploring Social Procurement for discussion of social enterprise definition. 2 “Social procurement can be understood as the use of purchasing power to create social value.” 3 See recommendations in the City of Victoria Mayor’s Taskforce on Social Enterprise and Social Procurement for

additional considerations. 4 Anchor expenditure also includes insurance, taxes and other transfers between governments (grants and

contributions) and amortization and capital asset depreciation. 5 It is important to note that many of these buyers and anchor institutions are in the early phases of pilot initiatives

and policy or framework implementation. This figure should be interpreted as the potential spend and not what is

currently subject to social or community benefit criteria. 6 Michael Porter, in ICIC and Prudential Foundation 2014 Creating an Anchored Local Economy in Newark

Recommendations for Implementing a Comprehensive Local Procurement Strategy. 7 Definition of anchor institution provided by the Atkinson Foundation drawing on the work of Michael Porter. 8 See: ICIC and Prudential Foundation 2014 Creating an Anchored Local Economy in Newark Recommendations

for Implementing a Comprehensive Local Procurement Strategy for discussion of extending the anchor concept to

other types of organizations with considerable purchasing power in their communities.

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33

9 See for example Mowat Centre and Atkinson Foundation Report 2015 The Prosperous Province: Strategies for

Building Community Wealth. Available at: http://anchorinstitutions.ca/ 10 However, if the anchor has a policy or framework but fell below the $5 M threshold, they were included in the

scan. 11 This may not be a comprehensive list. Large non-profit organizations like the YMCA, sports associations, art

galleries, etc. could also be considered in future research. 12 For a detailed discussion of the challenges of estimating addressable spend in the context of local procurement,

see: ICIC and Prudential Foundation 2014. 13 This figure removes spending on interest payments to service debt and utilities. It is important to note that some

items are specialized and cannot be sourced locally or do not have a viable social benefit. However, in absence of

more detailed procurement data, more precise estimates are not possible. 14 Personal correspondence, Village of Cumberland 15 The Town of Ladysmith is expected to adopt a social procurement policy this year. 16 Camosun College see: http://camosun.ca/sustainability/operations/food.html 17 BC Hydro RFP Reference # 5134 Food and Beverage Services for the Edmonds Building in Burnaby. Question

#21. 18 Personal correspondence, Sandra Hamilton, Project lead 19 https://archive.news.gov.bc.ca/releases/news_releases_2013-2017/2015TRAN0157-001907.pdf 20 BC Hydro

https://www.bchydro.com/community/aboriginal_relations/key_initiatives/economic_development.html 21 https://www.bchousing.org/partner-services/major-projects/the-view 22 Build Magazine (2016) Social Innovation in Public Sector Procurement. Available at: https://cumberland.ca/wp-

content/uploads/2015/09/BUILD-Magazine-VICA-2016-Social-Innovation-in-Public-Sector-Procurement-Sandra-

Hamilton.pdf 23 Hamilton, S. People, Planet and Profit. See page 30-31. http://www.nrca.ca/media/Northworks_2017_Web.pdf 24 Social Innovation in BC (2017) Available at: http://www.hubcapbc.ca/Documents/Social-Innovation-in-

BC/SIBC_Economic.aspx 25 Social Innovation in BC (2017) Page 9, Available at: http://www.hubcapbc.ca/Documents/Social-Innovation-in-

BC/SIBC_Economic.aspx 26 City of Courtenay Council Meeting Minutes – December 19, 2016. Available at:

http://www.courtenay.ca/assets/City~Hall/Council/Agendas/2016/2016-12-19%20Council%20Agenda.pdf 27 City of Courtenay Council Meeting Minutes – December 19, 2016. Available at:

http://www.courtenay.ca/assets/City~Hall/Council/Agendas/2016/2016-12-19%20Council%20Agenda.pdf 28 Fact Sheet: Social Innovation in BC: https://news.gov.bc.ca/factsheets/factsheet-social-innovation-in-british-

columbia 29 AASHE Scorecard for University of Victoria, 2017 30 Committee of the Whole, Agenda 2016. See Sandra Hamilton Briefing Note, pg. 70 31 For example, a recent evaluation of the Scottish community benefit clause found that traditional firms are

beginning to hire community benefit experts to stay competitive in bidding on public contracts. Traditional firms can

also integrate social enterprise and local business into their supply chains.

32 http://www.mnbc.ca/app/webroot/uploads/Features/Features_2016/Invitation_-

_Site_C_AB_Business_Networking_Sessions-January_2016_.pdf 33 http://www.newswire.ca/news-releases/syrian-refugees-join-bcs-skilled-workforce---roofing-community-steps-

up-with-training-and-jobs-614661004.html 34 Correspondence, Sandra Hamilton 35 City of Courtenay Council Meeting Minutes – December 19, 2016. Available at:

http://www.courtenay.ca/assets/City~Hall/Council/Agendas/2016/2016-12-19%20Council%20Agenda.pdf 36 City of Victoria: The Mayor’s Taskforce on Social Enterprise and Social Procurement Action Plan. Available at:

https://ccednet-rcdec.ca/sites/ccednet-rcdec.ca/files/sesp_action_plan_e.pdf

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37 Based on extensive research for her Social MBA and with the benefit of practitioner experience, Sandra Hamilton

explains, “public sector supply chains can, and should be, better leveraged to achieve social value and there are

absolutely ways to do this in a trade agreement compliant manner.” 38 Purchasing Power Report (2017) McConnell Family Foundation Food Secure Canada Report Available at:

https://foodsecurecanada.org/sites/foodsecurecanada.org/files/purchasing_power_report2017.pdf 39 Personal Interview, Vancity Savings Credit Union 40 Sutherland, V., McTier, A., Glass, A. and McGregor, A. (2015) Analysis of the Impact and Value of Community

Benefit Clauses in Procurement. Project Report. Scottish Government, Edinburgh. “For example, the tenders

submitted were too expensive compared to other tenders received or presented too much risk and uncertainty for the

main contractor. If social enterprises are to be targeted, continued support is needed to enable them to be

competitive in a tendering process.” 41 Purchasing Power Report (2017) McConnell Family Foundation Food Secure Canada Report Available at:

https://foodsecurecanada.org/sites/foodsecurecanada.org/files/purchasing_power_report2017.pdf 42 Learning Enrichment Foundation (2015) The Social Procurement Intermediary. Available at:

http://www.lefca.org/documents/Social-Procurement-Intermediary-LEF-2015.pdf 43 Toward a Community Benefit Model of Procurement in Community Services

http://www.communitycouncil.ca/sites/default/files/CSPC_Report_Community_Benefit_Procurement_model_2013J

anuary.pdf 44 Personal interview, Sandra Hamilton 45 Personal interview, Sandra Hamilton 46 See for example, David Le Page 2014; Sandra Hamilton, 2015; Atkinson Foundation, 2016 47 BC Short form RFP: http://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/governments/services-for-government/bc-bid-

resources/templates-and-tools/solicitation-templates/short-form-request-for-proposal 48 Sandra Hamilton, NIC FEED Comox Valley, Purchasing Power Report (2017) McConnell Family Foundation

Food Secure Canada Report Available at:

https://foodsecurecanada.org/sites/foodsecurecanada.org/files/purchasing_power_report2017.pdf 49 AASHE Scorecard for University of Victoria 2017 50 ibid 51 Vendors can register at: www.bcaboriginalvendors.ca/aboriginal_vendors 52 Hebb and Hachigian (2017) 53 ibid (2017) 54 AASHE Scorecard for University of Victoria 2017. See UVic food bev inventory_STARS.xlsx 55 BC Bid: BC Hydro 56 Sandra Hamilton, 2016. Social Procurement in Infrastructure. People, planet and profit. Bringing focus back to

people. Available at:

http://www.sandrahamilton.ca/assets/uploads/northworks_mag_2017__social_procurement_in_infrastructure_59814

.pdf 57 Sandra Hamilton is working with municipalities and construction associations in both BC and in Alberta to

design a uniform process, that ideally, will not look different in every municipality. 58 Personal interview, Keith Hennessey 59 Personal interview, Keith Hennessey 60 Learning Enrichment Foundation (2015) The Social Procurement Intermediary. Available at:

http://www.lefca.org/documents/Social-Procurement-Intermediary-LEF-2015.pdf 61 Ronicle, J. and Fox, T. (2015). ICRF (Investment and Contract Readiness Fund) Final Report. Intermediaries: Do

we want them to thrive or just survive? 62 Also see LEF (2015) for a review of the role of intermediaries in advancing social procurement in Ontario 63 Personal interview, David LePage 64 Learning Enrichment Foundation (2015) The Social Procurement Intermediary. Available at:

http://www.lefca.org/documents/Social-Procurement-Intermediary-LEF-2015.pdf 65 There is a precedent for inclusion of social benefit and diversity criteria in similar events, including past

Commonwealth Games (Scotland), Pan Am Games (Toronto) and Vancouver 2010 Olympics.