Conversations with DEI: Importance of Queer Spaces and Building Community with Eli Bauwah

Welcome to the special edition of the Conversations with WLI, where ULI Toronto's Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Reconciliation Committee highlights the changemakers who are doing amazing DEI work in city building in our new Conversations with DEI podcast with Jennifer Khan and Sameer Patel. In this fourth and final episode, they speak with Eli Bauwah, who shares the importance of queer spaces and building community connections to support one another with Eli Bauwah. Jc Elijah (Eli) M. Bawuah (he/him) is a practicing Urban Planner and Public Consultant with multi-disciplinary experience gained by working in a spectrum of city and community-building roles. He has worked on development applications, master plans, social plans, mobility/transportation projects across Ontario. Eli has co-developed equity initiatives centering the lived experiences and voices of Toronto’s diverse urban stakeholders, while fostering collaborative environments that generate values of reciprocity and sustainability. To Eli, leadership is about allowing yourself to be vulnerable while advocating for what you believe in that may benefit someone other than yourself. This is why he co-founded the Mentoring Initiative for Indigenous and Planners of Colour (MIIPOC). With the goal to advance diversity and representation amongst city-builders and leadership, the Mentoring Initiative for Indigenous and Planners of Colour (MIIPOC) focuses on establishing a national network between experienced planners and emerging planners from marginalized communities. As a former Committee Member of the City of Toronto’s 2SLGBTQ+ Council Advisory Body, he advised and helped to inform strategies aimed at removing barriers faced by the queer community.