AGM 2009 - Executive Director's Message

Thank you, Harlan, and let’s pause to thank Harlan for his magnificent contribution in his first year as chair of the FST board.  You have given us so freely of your time and thoughts and led us very well through a busy year.  I am looking forward to our next year together. 

The executive director’s message is meant to point out some highlights of the past year and there is so much material, I hardly know where to begin.  The world and we, its citizens have all experienced a year like we have never seen or possibly imagined in terms of global economics.  No one foresaw the convergence of events which resulted in the worldwide financial crash.  More recently, we have witnessed another unthinkable – the dismantling of the mighty auto industry.  Even my 93 year old father whose brain doesn’t take in much that is new these days, realized that this was a shocking thing. At this time of frightening uncertainty and devastating loss for individuals and the world, one is tempted to think gloomy thoughts about ourselves, our progress and our future.  At FST, we know first hand about the excruciating pressure and anxiety felt by many people as they fear unemployment and the inability to care for their families; we see the impact of poverty on the capacity of communities and the aspirations of Toronto’s people; we support women and children who feel the brunt of these fears and anxieties in the most immediate physical and emotional ways. 

And yet, we have also experienced a year of unforeseen and transformative events, of unanticipated generosity and hopefulness, of great resilience and aspirations.    For this was the year when Ontario got a Poverty Reduction Strategy and accompanying legislation to provide accountability into the future.  This was the year when mental health, children’s mental health and addictions are being discussed so openly by so many that a real process of destigmatization is beginning to be felt.  This was the year when Barack Obama was elected President of the United States with the simple, hopeful slogan of “yes we can”; and millions of people of colour around the world felt, possibly for the first time, that their hopes and dreams were achievable. 

This was the year when the United Way, which provides so much essential core funding for Toronto social service organizations like FST, had the incredible misfortune to embark on their annual campaign in the depths of the financial meltdown; and yet, they achieved their goal.  In a time of extraordinary financial uncertainty and personal loss for individual and corporate donors, people gave basically as much as they had given in the previous record-breaking year. 

This was the year, of all years in recent memory, when people could have retrenched, protected themselves and been ungenerous; but that is not what I see happening.  I see people putting themselves in other people’s shoes like never before, realizing so profoundly that we are truly all in this together and that we can do better for and with human life. 

I want to thank the FST staff who keep coming in every day and doing a magnificent job in spite of the uncertainties, tensions and changes we have experienced this year.  You personify resilience and hopefulness, even when you feel least able, for you are the ones who hear directly from clients and program participants about the real hardships they are facing and you work with them to find a way forward when they feel most desperate and unable.  Thank you for your dedication to this great, good organization, FST.

 

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