Everton Dixon

City/Township Council · Kitchener Ward 10

All topics Housing Getting Around Climate Food Growth & Planning Budget & Taxes

This candidate finalized their responses after this guide and scoring methodology was published.

Food Systems & Security

In the context of growing pressure for economic development and the connected loss of farmland, what role do municipalities and the Region hold in promoting local food livelihoods, production, and processing?ranked from highest to lowest importance

Partner with other levels of government to develop local food hubs that reduce costs and barriers for small businesses
Promote and support low-barrier spaces for local producers to distribute and sell food
Encourage and support local landowners to rent to newcomer farmers
Develop a local food strategy, including research on how land-use change affects the food system
Leave local food livelihoods to the private market

How should municipalities and the Region approach food insecurity and affordability?select up to 3 per part

A. Access to food

Partner with local charities, non-profits, and other organizations to strengthen access to food and redistribution of surplus food and produce for low-income residents
Support local food procurement for school food programs, including processing/preparation infrastructure, food literacy, and youth learning opportunities
ntegrate food preparation and community meals into low-barrier peer employment programs so our vulnerable neighbours gain both nutrition and income.

B. Access to land for growing food

Make public lands (Regional and municipal) available for sustenance food provisioning, including in urban and peri-urban spaces as cities expand
Enable access to land and resources for local people who want to grow their own food (e.g. the community-garden model)
Partner with Indigenous-led organizations to establish urban agriculture and medicine gardens across municipally held lands on the Haldimand Tract.

Please describe one concrete policy, program, or decision you would support to strengthen the local food system.candidate's own words

To address food insecurity at its root, Kitchener must combine social procurement with low-barrier access to municipal infrastructure for local food producers. I will champion a municipal program that opens city-owned commercial kitchens and underutilized community centre facilities during off-peak hours for local food entrepreneurs, non-profits, and newcomer caterers at low or no cost. Pairing this with a streamlined municipal licensing process for home-based and micro-food businesses allows resident cooks, bakers, and urban growers to generate independent income, build local wealth, and supply fresh, culturally relevant food directly to their neighbourhoods. Furthermore,we should never stop reframing affordability from the limited gaze of the unhoused and newcomers. Solutions and conversations must be reframed around working-class income stagnation and retirement- and working-class poverty; we must connect food production directly to municipal purchasing power. I support incorporating local food sourcing into a city-wide Social Procurement Policy, ensuring that municipal catering, event contracts, and city-funded programs prioritize local urban farms, food cooperatives, and equity-deserving food producers. By converting city infrastructure into shared processing spaces and using municipal procurement to guarantee local market demand, Kitchener can foster a self-sustaining local food economy that lowers costs for working families and drives grassroots economic mobility.

Would you like to provide any additional context for your views on food systems?candidate's own words

Kitchener and the RegionI should consider to refuse to accept a definition of sustainability that treats environmental health as an elite luxury or restricts its focus strictly to crisis management. Real municipal sustainability must be reframed around the everyday economic survival of Kitchener’s working class and seniors on fixed incomes, who are caught between stagnant wages, rising utility bills, and severe retirement poverty. When working families and pensioners spend an escalating percentage of their income just to keep the heat on and put food on the table, environmental policy must deliver direct financial relief and protection, not added cost burdens or performative slogans. This requires ensuring that green transition initiatives work for tenants and fixed-income homeowners rather than against them. Programs like RetroFitWR and Kitchener Utilities financing must be built with strict tenant safeguards so energy retrofits lower monthly utility bills for working families without giving corporate landlords a loophole for "green renovictions" or above-guideline rent increases. For our seniors, aging in place sustainably means keeping municipal utility rates predictable, expanding urban shade canopies along Ward 10 pedestrian routes to lower cooling costs during extreme heat, and ensuring city green investments do not drive up property taxes for those on fixed pensions. Equally important, protecting our local environment means protecting working-class pocketbooks from corporate grid exploitation.

Other priority not listed abovecandidate's own words

I would be open to discussing embedding local food procurement targets into municipal and regional purchasing agreements, directing institutional contracts toward local growers and Indigenous food sovereignty initiatives.