WinnipegREALTORS® initiated a campaign in 2008 to rally awareness and financial support for the Canadian Museum for Human Rights (CMHR). The local effort has spread outward to enlist REALTORS® from across the country.
REM, a Canadian monthly publication on the real estate industry, gave some prominence to this initiative in its April issue (the article is reprinted below).
Sheldon Zamick, a local REALTOR® and director of WinnipegREALTORS®, is heading up the national campaign. He has already spoken very passionately about the need to get behind this inspiring project at a major real estate conference in Banff at the end of January and at the Canadian Real Estate Association’s annual meeting earlier this month.
While he is pleased to say over $1.4 million has been raised to date, there is every reason to believe more can be achieved through making a strong appeal to REALTORS® in other provinces.
A special message from Sheldon Zamick, chair REALTOR® campaign:
“After meeting with many leaders of organized real estate in Canada and some from the U.S., I am more convinced now than ever before that our national campaign is about to get under way. Many presidents of associations and boards told me that they are now prepared to support this very important cause.
“Upon completion of my speech in Ottawa at the CREA conference, one of the leading Alberta REALTORS® approached me and provided me with a personal cheque of $5,000, and said that he would under take to encourage other REALTORS® in his province, as well as from across Canada, to support our new Canadian Museum for Human Rights.”
REALTORS® asked to support
human rights museum
Through member donations, WinnipegREALTORS® has raised more than $1.4 million in support of the Canadian Museum for Human Rights (CMHR). Now they’re calling on REALTORS® from coast to coast to contribute and “give our brand the attention it deserves,” said Winnipeg REALTORS® campaign chair Sheldon Zamick. This “is a golden opportunity to put the REALTOR® brand on the museum.”
The CMHR, Canada’s first national museum in more than 40 years, is being constructed in Winnipeg. It will house the stories of human rights struggles and triumphs, serve as a national and international place for human rights learning, dialogue, debate and action, and will house a resource centre featuring lessons from the past, according to the museum.
“The museum will change the world by enhancing people’s understanding of human rights, promoting respect for others and encouraging reflection and dialogue.”
Permanent recognition within the museum will acknowledge cumulative capital contributions of $10,000 or more. Long-term naming opportunities are also available for contributions of $1-million or more. All donors will be recognized on the Friends of the CMHR website and in publications throughout the campaign.
“The museum speaks to REALTORS® in a number of important ways. Canada’s ability to attract foreign investments and new immigrants rests on its reputation of upholding the rule of law, “ wrote Zamick. “Canada’s highly regarded brand is based on being an inclusive and open country known for respecting human rights and being tolerant of people from all walks of life and faiths.
“As an industry which has embraced quality of life principles, including preservation and protection of property rights, human rights is a fundamental prerequisite to respecting property rights.
“This unique museum will educate Canadians on the importance of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights — a milestone document that not only establishes basic principles at the very heart of the human rights movement, but also recognizes property rights.”
In addition to housing social history in Canada and around the world, the CMHR hopes to shape the attitudes and actions of generations to come.
The museum, which features a glass tower, was designed by architect Antoine Predock, winner of an international architectural design competition for the CMHR. Predock was chosen by an international architectural review committee. Its members saw the architect’s design as one that “could fulfill the objectives for an inspirational building that achieves a complexity relating to the diversity of human experience.”
Construction of the $310-million project began in 2009 and it is scheduled to open in 2013.
The museum’s location in Winnipeg is “significant given Winnipeg’s rich history of human rights progress (women’s rights, labour rights, French language rights). Equally significant is the museum’s site at the junction of the Red and Assiniboine rivers, which has been a meeting place for thousands of years. This area, now known simply as The Forks, is where early First Nations people assembled to settle disputes through peaceful negotiation,” acording to literature provided by the museum information.
Property Rights form part of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1947). Article 17 states everyone has the right to own property alone as well as in association with others, and no one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his property.