News Update:

As of July 1st 2010, St. James Community Service Society no longer provides Home Support services in Vancouver's Downtown Eastside. Services are now provided through Greater Vancouver Community Health Services Society. If you have any enquiries about the program, please contact Diana Hill, Director of Home Support Services at 604-714-3502.

Background:

Home Support services across the Lower Mainland were recently retendered by Vancouver Coastal Health (VCH) and Fraser Health (FH). The goal was to provide a more standardized service with fewer providers in order to take advantage of financial economies of scale.

As a small, niche provider of Home Support Services in the DTES, it became clear to us at St. James that one of the larger, specialized home support providers will operate the service more effectively and efficiently than we can. As a result St. James decided not to submit a bid, instead supporting the bid of Greater Vancouver Community Health Services Society, a community organization that specializes in home support services. Instead St. James will be focussing on our core areas of expertise, particularly hospice care, emergency and supported housing, financial services, etc.

With GVCSS we recently completed a service transition that ensured continuity of both service for clients (no service hours were lost) and employment for staff (all staff who wanted postions had their employment transferred under the same terms and conditions).

This was not an easy decision for St. James. However the Board and senior staff are clear that this was the best course of action not only for the local community, but also for St. James. We are enormously grateful to the staff who have provided dedicated service to local clients over many years, and we are pleased that they will be able to continue to provide this support in the future.

For any further information, please contact Jonathan Oldman, Executive Director, at 604-606-0307.