Events

NEW SUMMER LOCATION

3rd Thursday of every month
6:00PM
40 Oak St. (East of Parliament, South of Gerrard)

Free Event with: Dinner, Childcare, Wheelchair Access, Tokens

July 21st - Colonialism
Speakers: Sigrid Kneve and Ruth Koleszar-Green
- What is colonialism?
- What is does colonialism look like in our neighbourhood?
- How can we decolonize?

Click here for audio from July 21st - Colonialism.
With Speakers Sigrid Kneve and Ruth Koleszar-Green

Facebook Event Page here

This year, OCAP hit a rare milestone in anti-capitalist community organizing: we turned 25 years old!

This year, OCAP hit a rare milestone in anti-capitalist community organizing: we turned 25 years old! Over the years we have learned a lot about organizing and some of that has been compiled into an online course so we can share what we know with others.

FAQ:

• How long is it? 8 weeks
• When is it? It begins the week of January 1-7. It is self guided so you can do it on your own schedule for each week
• How much time a week will it take? This will vary depending on the week but each week has about a 10 minute video by John and A.J. about the week. Each week also has course materials. These usually take the form of relatively accessible readings but also may be additional videos, audio recordings and comics. You can also participate in the discussion boards with other students and the instructors if you want. So, it depends on how much discussion you want to participate in and how long it takes you to read the articles. We’d guess that you should plan for 2-3 hours a week. There won’t be assignments beyond going over the materials.
• How much is it? Sliding scale - $25/50
• What do I need for it? All of the readings and video connections are online so the only thing you need is access to a computer with an internet connection.
• How do I sign up? Click here.

Below is the interview Justin Podur did with course instructors John Clarke and A.J. Withers about the course which was published in The Bullet.

No Social Cleansing in Toronto! Save Downtown Homeless Shelters and Services!

Meal and Community Meeting

Wednesday, April 15
6.00 PM
St Luke’s Church (353 Sherbourne, at Carlton)

Download the Poster for this event HERE,
And Download the Flyer for this event HERE!

DTE Community Forum – TAVIS in the Neighbourhood
Thursday August 7, 2014
6pm - Community meal
6:30 - 7:30 - Forum
7:30 – 8pm - Social - tea/coffee and desserts
40 Oak St - C.R.C.*
*This space is accessible and has accessible washrooms

Toronto's Downtown East Community is currently being targeted by TAVIS (Toronto Anti-Violence Intervention Strategy) from June 18 -September 8. While governments pay to send additional police into the neighbourhood – they refuse to provide the resources for the things that are actually needed.

We need decent and affordable housing, jobs that pay a living wage and incomes for people on welfare and disability that enable them to live in health and dignity.
We need opportunities, training/education and jobs for youth.
We do not need to be traumatized and criminalized by police harassment.
We need an end to targeted policing, an end to racial profiling and an end to police violence.

The people most directly affected by this attack include, people of colour, families and youth, people who use drugs, poor people, sex workers, and homeless people.

We need to come together in solidarity to challenge and defeat this attack. We need to make demands and organize for what our communities really need. We will not be priced, policed or pushed out of our
neighbourhoods.

The Ontario Coalition Against Poverty is holding a course to offer people some of the knowledge and skills they will need to mobilize in their communities to resist poverty and austerity. Since the last course, OCAP has fought for more shelter beds, a women's drop in, for a raise to social assistance rates, against cuts to ODSP and against gentrification and policing in the downtown East.

DATES:
4 consecutive Saturdays:
September 6th, 13th, 20th, and 27th

TIME: 2-5pm

followed by a meal each week.

Childcare and transportation costs will be provided and the location is wheelchair accessible, with accessible washrooms.

Saturday, September 14 11am - 1pm

Meet at: the corner of Dundas/Sherbourne, will end at Allan Gardens Park

In the lead-up to the September 22nd ‘Taking it Back’ housing march and action, we are offering this walking tour by OCAP member, long time organizer in the neighborhood, and people’s historian, Gaetan Heroux. Get to know the history, and help build on the history of resistance September 22nd!

Description of Poor Peoples’ History of East Downtown Toronto Walking Tour:

For close to two centuries East Downtown Toronto has welcomed the unemployed, homeless and working poor. Infrastructures to support the unemployed, some of which date back to the establishment of Toronto first poor house to the 1830’s, are now being threatened and dismantled by the city to make room for Toronto’s more affluent residents. Where will the unemployed, homeless, and poor residents go? The tour will explore how Toronto’s “skid row” came to be established in East Downtown Toronto. What has been the relationship of Toronto poor with Toronto wealthy residents over the last one-seventy-years? What happened to the slums of Cabbagetown and how are they related to Regent Park, Canada’s largest social housing complex? There is also long history organizing and militant resistance in East Downtown Toronto by the unemployed and the homeless dating back to the 1890’s. How are these struggles connected to later unemployed battles of the 1930’s and 1990’s? These questions and much more will be explored in the tour.

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Taking it Back: Housing Shelter, Safe Space Now!

Sunday, September 22nd

3pm

Allan Gardens Park

Meal, gathering, march and action

THURSDAY MAY 19th, 2011
6 – 8pm
@ St.Luke's Church, 353 Sherbourne St. (Carlton and Sherbourne)

The Ontario Coalition Against Poverty has been spearheading the ‘Raise the Rates Campaign’ since 2005, demanding a real raise in welfare (OW) and disability (ODSP) rates to where people can live with health and dignity.

A central part of this has been access to the Special Diet Allowance – a vital benefit that has allowed for some small amount of relief from the miserable amounts that people are forced to try to survive on every month.

What is the history of welfare and disability, what is the history of this campaign, what is actually happening with the Special Diet Allowance as of April 2011, and how do we win a raise in social assistance rates TODAY?

Learn the facts and history, know the arguments, join the campaign!