Toronto Newcomer Initiative
TNI is a pilot initiative to explore ways for the City of Toronto to encourage the participation of newcomers in the life of the city and community. The pilot activities focus on the enhancement of City service system and the broader service system.
The main focus of TNI is for the City to experiment with pilot projects with an emphasis on partnering and collaborating with partners from multiple sectors to help develop the City of Toronto Newcomer Strategy. The practical learnings from pilot projects as well as the advice and input of the broad range of stakeholders will help the City develop a Toronto Newcomer Strategy.
Below you'll find some more details and the contact information for the following active TNI projects:
Newcomer Programming
Reunification Adaptation Project (RAP)
Toronto Newcomer Health Research Project
Toronto Local Immigration Partnerships
There are thousands of recreational programs for people of all ages operating daily in community centres and parks across the Toronto. Additionally, there are many new programs specifically designed with newcomers in mind. You can get information about programs at your local community centre and also suggest ideas for new ones. For a complete listing of the programs available in your neighbourhood visit Toronto Fun Online.
If you are registering for the first time, please visit the registration information section of the City's Parks, Forestry and Recreation website to find out exactly what you need to do to get started.
You can also contact:
Prince Agbo, Supervisor
Tel (416) 338-6792 / pagbo@toronto.ca
Rosa Jones-Imhotep, Supervisor
Tel (416) 338-5061 / rjones3@toronto.ca
The globalized market for workers and jobs has often causes families to separate in order to find work. The separation takes many forms: a spouse comes to Toronto to work or leaves the family in Toronto to work overseas; a child or youth joins his or her parents in Toronto after many years apart; or a youth or adult comes to Toronto seeking safety. Children and youth are particularly vulnerable because lengthy separations undermine the family and make reunification difficult. To address these issues, Toronto Public Health has partnered with ten newcomer-serving agencies to provide peer support groups for adults and youth who are dealing with family separation and the challenge of reunification. RAP staff are also meeting with representatives of organizations that provide services to children and youth to raise awareness of these issues and promote change.
For more information, please contact:
Rebecca Bassey, RAP Project Manager
Tel (416) 338-8189/ rbassey@toronto.ca
Toronto Public Health and Access Alliance Multicultural Health and Community Services are collaborating on a research project to deepen our understanding of the health status and health needs of newcomers in Toronto. The project's findings will provide insight into how government, health care and community agencies can better maintain, promote and improve the health of newcomers in our city.
Download: The Global City: Newcomer Health Report in Toronto
For more information about Newcomer Health Research, please refer to the project webpage:
http://toronto.ca/health/map/newcomer.htm
or contact:
Liz Corson, TPH Interim Project Manager
Tel (416) 338-8102 / lcorson@toronto.ca
Andrew Koch, Research Coordinator
Tel (416) 324-8677 / akoch@accessalliance.ca
Local Immigration Partnerships (LIPs) are funded by Citizenship and Immigration Canada to help facilitate coordination between the non-profit agencies, government and the for-profit sector to better meet newcomer needs and support their settlement process and access to the labour market. A LIP is a partnership table that is focused on planning; it is composed of representatives from the non-profit (community-based) agencies, private (for-profit) organizations and public (government) institutions.
In other Ontario municipalities, there is only one Local Immigration Partnership (LIP) table. However, given the size and complexity of the City of Toronto, the following neighbourhood-based LIPs were established as well as a City-Wide partnership table:
The City-Wide LIP is where the LIPs are represented along with other multi-sectoral city-wide stakeholders including:
Auberge Francophone
College Boreal
Centre Francophone de Toronto
City of Toronto
Citizenship & Immigration Canada (CIC)
COSTI
Council of Educators
Francophone Immigration Network Support
Ministry of Citizenship & Immigration (MCI)
Ministry of Training, Colleges & Universities (MTCU)
Ontario Council of Agencies Serving Immigrants (OCASI)
Service Canada
Toronto Region Immigrant Employment Council (TRIEC)
United Way
The current City-Wide LIP is working to develop a Toronto Newcomer Strategy. This involves looking at all recommendations from the local Toronto LIP strategy and action plans and other input to determine next steps. The primary goal of the strategy will be to support coordination and collaboration in the broader city-wide service system for improved social and economic outcomes for newcomers.
Key Contact:
Sonali Chakraborti, Project Manager - schakra2@toronto.ca
Nisha Nagaratnam, Community Development Officer - nnagara@toronto.ca
The Toronto Newcomer Initiative has been generously funded by:
