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Unsung Hero Award
 Natalia Crowe, Cawthra Mansions Co-op
As a director at Cawthra Mansions Co-op, Natalia Crowe became interested in the co-op’s younger residents. In her role as chair of the Member Participation Committee, she started a youth involvement program, and she has continued this activity since leaving the board.
With Natalia’s support and encouragement, most of the youth at Cawthra Mansions are involved in a variety of projects. Some assist the co-op’s seniors. Young people have been organizing food drives and helping with composting. Many of the kids are involved in web design and other computer-related activities. They have been researching various grants and scholarships and encouraging Cawthra’s youth to apply.
Natalia is a student herself, completing a master’s degree, but she remains an active member and an advocate for the co-op’s young people. A director writes: “If not for her innovation and start-up, I would not be at all surprised if our youth were still underrepresented here. Now, thanks to Natalia, they have more of a voice and an opportunity in our thriving community.”
 Marcus Asamoah, Maurice Coulter Co-op
Marcus Asamoah recently completed his final year in the business program at Ryerson. For some students, a demanding course of study would be plenty to occupy the hours in a day. But Marcus has always made time for his co-op, where he has lived since the age of 5.
In 2006, Marcus started a homework club for Maurice Coulter Co-op’s kids. He ran the program all day on Saturdays and two or three nights every week. When he couldn’t find enough volunteers in the co-op, he persuaded some friends from Scarborough to come all the way across the city to his Etobicoke neighbourhood to help out. Marcus still runs the homework club twice a week.
At the same time, he was active in setting up a computer centre, doing much of the necessary labour himself. He worked with a local business, Woodbine Entertainment Group, to get computers donated. Like his father, who served on the co-op’s board of directors, Marcus Asamoah believes in giving back to his community and steps right up to get the job done.
Youth Award
 Dorian Johnson, Bleecker Street Co-op
You could say Dorian Johnson was born to co-ops: in fact, he was the first baby born in Bleecker Street Co-op. As an infant he attended board meetings (in an unelected capacity), and he addressed a CHF Canada annual general meeting at age 9.
It might be easier to list what Dorian has not done at Bleecker Street than to tally up everything he has done. Now 15, he is also a good student who participates in extracurricular activities at his school.
Bleecker Street was the first co-op to take part in Toronto’s Pride celebrations, in 1998, and Dorian was there. He has worked on the award-winning “Bleecker Big Mouth Newsletter,” a youth-run publication, and in “Bleecker Kids at Your Service,” a crew who help out at social functions by serving food and cleaning up afterwards. Dorian has been a mentor at Bleecker Street’s Summer Camp and a member of the Clean-up Crew, the team of young people who spend two weeks each summer improving the appearance of the co-op’s neighbourhood. Recently he has served as a recycling educator and floor captain.
In August 2006 Bleecker Street mounted a protest at the International AIDS Conference, and Dorian pulled together co-op youth to help. That fall he organized the co-op kids to raise $950 for the CHFT Coats for Kids program. This spring Dorian focused his efforts on raising funds for the Ladybug Foundation, a Winnipeg-based charity whose founder, 11-year-old Hannah Taylor, spoke at the 2007 CHF Canada AGM. Bleecker Street’s AGM delegates, knowing they had Dorian on the case, pledged $1,000 to the foundation.
Dorian Johnson is a leader and mentor to many residents, young and not so young, at his co-op. He sets a fine example for all co-operators.
 Broadview Community Youth Group, Broadview Housing Co-operative
Broadview Housing Co-op has formed a partnership with members of its community to create programming for local youth. Broadview had previously run a summer day camp for its own kids for four years, with the help of a federal grant.
The new joint venture, called the Broadview Community Youth Group (BCYG), is a charity with board members from both the co-op and the community at large. It runs camps during the summer months and the winter and spring breaks, as well as special events throughout the year. There are plans to expand programming over the next few years.
The summer camp offers sports, arts, cooking, drama and dance, games, and outdoor activities for children ages 5 to 14. The BCYG has its own Youth Talent Show and Summer Olympics. Field trips to the Ontario Science Centre and the Toronto Islands are part of the fun. The camp is free except for field trips, which require a small fee.
The BCYG uses the co-op’s common room as a home base but holds activities in other locations as well. Co-op children are given priority over community residents in applying for the programs, and special event fees are lower for co-op kids. Co-op children can bring guests from outside the co-op, as long as the guests are registered. The BCYG also offers leadership training for youth ages 15 and 16, who can help out as volunteers.
The BCYG provides engaging activities for youth and builds bridges to its community, helping to spread the good word about co-operative housing.
Living in Diversity Award
 Bleecker Street Co-op
Diversity at Bleecker Street Co-op means many things. The co-op is a regular participant in Toronto’s Pride festivities; it organizes social events that showcase ethnic and cultural diversity; and it focuses much of its activities on children and youth.
The annual Bleecker Street party during Pride Week draws in neighbourhood residents as well as co-op families. This February’s co-op social event was “Bombay Night,” showcasing the South Asian community. These interactive, well-attended events bring people together and provide both enjoyment and education. “Nothing bonds individuals better than food, laughter and music. We find that learning is best served as a side-dish to FUN!”
The focus on youth programming has many benefits, not least the goodwill that results when kids grow up spending lots of time in groups of various backgrounds. These children’s appreciation of diversity will make them better citizens and help them to lead fuller and happier lives.
Over the past year, Bleecker Street has been building “Team Diversity,” an initiative bringing together co-op volunteers and community members from groups that may face discrimination in accessing support programs and housing. The team will lead events and workshops with the goal of informing the practices of service and housing providers and eventually breaking down the barriers that reduce access to essential services for everyone.
 OWN Housing Co-operative
The Diversity Committee at OWN Housing Co-operative was created in 2001. Led by a group of elder women, it has continued to “value and celebrate” diversity by “offering unique and interesting opportunities for members to share of themselves, their lives and their culture.”
The committee’s special projects have included a foreign film festival, observances for the Year of the Veteran, a community calendar, and the “OWN Map of the World,” which shows the heritage of each member in a display based on a world map.
Celebrations of various religious and cultural events take place throughout the year. The co-op has an ongoing partnership with the local schools that brings student artwork into the building, to showcase the diversity of the wider community.
OWN Co-op celebrated its 10th anniversary this year. To mark the occasion, the annual International Dinner was combined with the 10th-year celebrations, and the Diversity Committee has been working to produce an International Cookbook. With the help of a grant from CHF Canada, it will showcase the dishes that members prepare for the annual dinners by drawing upon their own backgrounds.
Housing Co-operative Achievement of the Year Award
 Bleecker Street Co-op
Bleecker Street Co-op has a long history of support for people living with HIV. It was the first co-op in Canada to give priority housing to HIV-positive people. When the International AIDS Conference was held in Toronto in August 2006 and Prime Minister Stephen Harper announced that he would not attend, Bleecker Street members led a demonstration to shame the Canadian government.
A co-op member who is also a director of an NGO concerned with HIV treatment started the action himself just a few days before the conference began. When co-op staff and members learned of the plan, it became a Bleecker Street project. The group obtained a thousand white pillowcases and set up an assembly line outside the co-op to stencil them with the message “Sleep in Steve? HIV never sleeps!” The stencilling became an eight-hour event in itself, with music and high spirits, and neighbourhood residents got involved.
The pillowcases were distributed to conference delegates. When the federal minister of health began to speak, delegates stood and held up the pillowcases. Media attention was immediate and intense, and the images were seen all over the planet. The pillowcases were a prized souvenir for conference delegates, with the result that there is a little bit of Bleecker Street in homes and offices around the world.
Co-op members took great pride in their role in making a statement about the prime minister’s absence. The action underscored the role of the co-op sector in providing the safe and stable housing and the sense of community that are fundamental to everyone’s health and well-being. It also reinforced Bleecker Street Co-op’s own vision of social justice, diversity, and community.
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