Executive Director's Message

Toronto / March 2019

"I am not free while any woman is unfree, even when her shackles are very different from my own”

and

“The master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house”

- Audre Lorde

Two quotes from the late prolific writer, lesbian-feminist, social justice warrior, Librarian Audre Lorde. Apt quotes I would say for the political moment in which we find ourselves especially this month as we mark International Women’s Day, a nod to working women although that herstory is often overlooked.

Toronto / February 2019

"They Tried to Bury Us/They didn’t know we were seeds."
- Mexican saying
"What did you not do to bury me/But you forgot that I was a seed?"
- Greek poet, Dinos Christianopoulous

Albert Jackson had a new stamp made in his image and released in time for African/Black History month, 2019. Toronto’s, and Canada’s, first Black mail carrier, this recognition of the contributions of Black folks to early Toronto, Ontario and Canada’s history is long overdue.

January 2019 / Toronto - In preparing to write my first blog of the year, the word ‘Hope’ came to me with a feeling of urgency.

December 2018 / Toronto - As we wind down the year, it is time to take a step back and reflect on what has been accomplished, what positive change or impact we have had, and how we will appreciate our accomplishments through self-care and organizational care. We do not do enough of this as advocates and practitioners in the public benefit sector. This is as good a time as any to start.

November 2018

It has been a very busy last few weeks as we prepared for and welcomed over two hundred sector leaders to our biennial Executive leadership conference; and marked forty years of OCASI’s policy advocacy, activism and sector development with a successful gala. It was a time of celebration, of congratulatory remarks, and acknowledgement of the resiliency of the sector and the impact it has had on the lives of tens of thousands of refugees, (im)migrants and Canadians. We laughed, we danced and we debated and we learned.

October 2018

September 2018

August 2018

It is the beginning of August and as it is every year after the celebration of the Caribbean Carnival formerly known as Caribana, and the celebration of Emancipation of people of African Descent from enslavement in the Americas (including Canada), there’s always this sense that this is the beginning of the end of summer.

July 2018 - The Friday before the long weekend and our national recognition and celebration by some and resistance by others of the formation of our country Canada, we were greeted with unexpected and disappointing news. The newly elected government of Ontario had decided to disregard tradition and do away with the Ministry of Citizenship and Immigration. The Ministry has played an important role in Ontario’s economic development plans.

June 2018

It is late Spring, feeling and looking like summer, a few days after I returned to Ontario after being away for a week on vacation in Jamaica (yes, I voted in the advance poll!). I came home to a province of mixed political and emotional sentiments - A Progressive Conservative majority government which some find concerning, wondering and worrying if the public policies and programs that they’ve worked so hard and long to bring to fruition will be done away with.