The Calgary Construction Association is partnering with SAIT to destigmatize conversations about mental health and addiction on jobsites in Alberta through the Tailgate Toolkit.
Tailgate Toolkit was pioneered by the Vancouver Island Construction Association and the local health authority, which identified 70 per cent of drug-related deaths were by people who worked in construction or transportation, said association president, Bill Black, at the Tuesday announcement in the Aldred Centre.
It was brought to Calgary last year, with the city providing funding for their second year as part of their community health program.
More than 200 constructions sites and organizations requested talks within the first two weeks of their launch, Black said.
“It is built off the old premise of a tailgate talk, a safety tailgate at the beginning of every day, which is a conversation around hazards, work, and what people have noticed and learned, just as a way to ensure safety awareness is first and foremost every day,” Black said. “The original tailgate toolbox talk was designed around physical safety, and this is the same idea, but this is about mental wellness and safety.”
The talks deliver information, awareness, and ideas on addressing mental health in a comfortable space.
The association has also partnered with the Headversity smartphone app to provide educational resources and a crisis line for anyone in distress.
Mental health in the male-dominated trade workforce has always been stigmatized since admitting that you’re struggling is seen as a sign of weakness, Black said.
A construction worker on the roof of a home in the new northwest Calgary community of Starling on March 10, 2026.
“Males will generally self-medicate, engage in self-destructive lifestyle, drugs, alcohol, dangerous sports, racing motorcycles, and it’s all because the problem never gets taken to the front and sit down and speak to somebody,” Black said. “Everybody has a breaking point. The more you bottle up, the worse it can break.”
They have already met with workers who need help and provided tools to help save lives.
“We actually received a phone call a few weeks ago from an individual who said,’ I’ve been putting off this talk, we just lost a young man to suicide last night, I feel responsible and we need to get this talk in place,” Black said. “And recently, because we distribute Narcan packages to each talk, an individual recently who’d been at one was out in his community and came across an individual that was overdosing. And because he had the package in his truck, he was able to save their life.”
The Tailgate allows students entering the workforce to be properly equipped academically and psychologically when they enter the workforce, said dean for the SAIT School of Construction, Jim Szautner.
SAIT’s Dean of Trades, Jim Szautner.
Exposing these resources as apprentices helps break those barriers in the future.
“We need to show them that it’s OK to talk about sensitive topics, to sit down and listen to one another, and to open up,” Szautner said. “So having resources like Tailgate Toolkit can allow our folks to be able to develop those skill sets while they’re here at SAIT, bridge that gap between industry, and then also develop the leaders of tomorrow.”
Their pilot event in April saw 500 students participate.
Szautner aims to bring 5,000 students through eight offerings that they will be providing next year.
In the future, Szautner said he would advocate in developing a curriculum guide that incorporates this form of programming into their apprenticeships and apprentices programs.
“The way it exists right now, the apprenticeship curriculum is very much focused on the technical aspect, the nuts and bolts, if you will, of the program and the technical skills that the apprentices need to have,” he said. “By taking some time to do sessions like this, (like) more lunch and learns, those types of things can certainly help open those doors for folks to do it and to formalize it within curriculum.”