Walk About is about advocacy

By Lethbridge Herald on September 15, 2025.

Disability rights advocates, community members and supporters begin the 15th Annual Citizen Walk About from City Hall to Galt Gardens Friday.

Joe Manio
Lethbridge Herald
Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

Disability self-advocates, families and allies walked shoulder-to-shoulder from City Hall to Galt Gardens Friday, during the 15th Annual Citizen Walk About to raise their voices for inclusion and disability rights in Southern Alberta. 

This year’s theme was ““Rising from the ashes, stronger than ever, together!” The long-time Citizen Walk About organizer, the Self Advocate-led Provincial Advocacy and Information Project (SAIPA), was defunded by the Alberta government in late 2024, leading to its complete shutdown. The Citizen Walk About was able to continue thanks to Inclusion Lethbridge and other sponsors..

“Right now, the disability community in Southern Alberta is facing extreme inequalities,” said Inclusion, Lethbridge community engagement and advocacy coordinator Chelsey Peat. “Especially now, with new scared tactics brought on by the government. Inclusion Lethbridge noticed that participants are starting to be affected and poverty is looking like it may actually be a reality for a lot of individuals that are already facing struggles.

“The disability community has been fighting for their independence and their aspects of equality, but they shouldn’t have to in 2025. They should be treated with the same amount of respect as any individual in any situation; but that is not the case right now. They’re facing extreme extreme bias and inequality in everything we’re seeing locally with inclusion.”

Members of the disabed community on Assured Income for the Severely Handicapped (AISH) recipients have been dealing with a reduction in their AISH benefits by the amount of the new federal Canada Disability Benefit (CDB)– $200 a month – if they didn’t provide proof by Sept. 5 that they have applied for it.

While advocates and people with disabilities view this as a harmful cut that will push many into poverty, the Alberta government justifies it by claiming it prevents Albertans from receiving duplicative benefits and aligns with existing requirements for AISH recipients to apply for other eligible income, calling the changes a “resource adjustment”

The province sees the CDB as a federal supplement to AISH and has made it part of the calculation for AISH benefits, meaning AISH recipients will not see the additional income from the CDB. 

Some critics suggest that funds clawed back from AISH recipients are being redirected to fund other government priorities, such as the province’s housing development goals. 

Minister Jason Nixon frames the changes as a way to increase fairness, suggesting that AISH clients, who are able to work more than others have greater opportunity to supplement their income.

Self-advocate and AISH recipient Ben Rowley, who took part in the Walk About, disagrees.

“A majority of people would rather be working because they would have better benefits,” he said. “A lot of people can’t work and that’s what AISH stands…assured income for the severely handicapped; for people who can’t work. And right now, Alberta has high unemployment. So if you’re competing against a university student with a degree (for example), who are they going to hire?”

The government claims that the changes allow for better allocation of funds and prioritizing essential, front-line services for people with disabilities. Advocates counter that reducing benefits, especially when paired with the lack of prior meaningful consultation, will drive people with disabilities into deeper poverty. 

Many disability advocates and community members also say they weren’t genuinely consulted about the changes, and the short consultation periods offered were inadequate for addressing the concerns of the disability community.

“We are asking for respect, but we are also asking for help in these times of struggle,” said Peat. “Like our theme for this year, ‘Rising from the Ashes’… that’s what we’re having to do. We’re having to fight through all these systemic and horribly biased expectations, and still try to get through our days through our lives, have money to eat, have that roof over our heads, we’re just asking for equity.”

Rowley echoed those sentiments, saying: “People with a disability are not freeloaders, we just want to have the supports we need and this even goes for education, and if you help us, if you support us we become part of the community, and we can give back.”