Inclusion Powell River Society

Who We Are

Inclusion Powell River is a Community Living organization that has served the qathet/Powell River region for nearly 70 years.

We began as an advocacy group for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities and have branched out to serve the broader disability community, children and seniors.

Why We Are Involved

We stand behind the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Disabled Persons which includes employment as a right. We believe in building communities where everyone can belong, and having equitable access to employment is part of that belonging.

We started as an advocacy collective of parents with children with disabilities who wanted to keep their children home instead of sending them to institutions, which was the norm in the last century.

Our social enterprise OneLight was initiated because a parent with an adult child with a disability who recognized that there needed to be a workplace that was fully inclusive of people with profound disabilities, while also being inclusive of people without disabilities.

Accessibility Initiatives

qathet Inclusive Manufacturing Pilot Project tested a model of inclusive employment in a manufacturing setting with great success: qimproject.com

OneLight Social Enterprise employs people with and without disabilities to manufacture a fire starter made from recycled materials: onelight.ca

We operate an employment program called Employers Services for local employers to recruit candidates with disabilities: inclusionpr.ca

We launched a province wide research project called the New Inclusive Economy which is currently investigating enabling structural conditions for inclusion in the workplace and runs until September 2023: newinclusiveeconomy.ca