About the Victoria West Community Association

The VWCA is a non profit community group that promotes the interests of the residents of the Victoria West neighbourhood. This is accomplished mainly through the many hours of volunteer work by its membership, the community and funding support from the City of Victoria. Events like Vic West Fest, the annual corn roast and monthly meetings to discuss concerns of residents are just a few examples of community building.

 
Mandate

1. To promote community vision, awareness and pride, and to encourage the participation of Vic West residents in community projects and events;
2. To facilitate the community having influence on decisions affecting the future;
3. To advocate for and facilitate participation by Vic West residents and developers, municipal agencies and other bodies concerning land use proposals, developments and public projects within Vic West;
4. To provide information on and raise awareness of issues that affect the community and its future;
5. To identify community needs and provide a forum for community members to raise issues of potential concern to the community; and, 
6. To engage members of the community as active participants in the Community Association.

The Vision

 Victoria West is the fastest-growing neighbourhood in the city with development on every side and  pressure for more. The fundamental questions that the 2003 Vision Project wanted to answer were:

The Visions Committee agreed the future is built on learning from the past and by creating an inventory of the present. So we decided to ask ourselves and our neighbours: what do I value most about my community and what is my vision for the future? What are the community's historical and current assets? What projects are a priority and could our neighborhood undertake  them together? Our overall goal for the Project was to develop a stronger sense of community, and to encourage more people to become involved in community activities. We wanted to increase the membership of the Community Association by bringing in new members of the community, and to identify several key projects that residents could work on together. 

The Actions

The Victoria West Community Association will continue to support the initiatives from the Visions project and use the information for neighborhood planning. Some action projects have begun as independent "spin-offs". These are: the Food Security Collective, the Community Gardens Project, Street Enhancement, School Enhancement and an Interactive Website  We believe the Victoria West Vision and Action Projects have been a catalyst for envisioning a healthy, vibrant community and for taking the first steps toward the realization of that Vision