Describe your charity/non-profit/volunteer work in a few sentences.

We are a registered charity that helps children who recently immigrated from Ukraine and Russia to Canada. We run a charity summer camp near Bracebridge Ontario to help underprivileged children.

What problem does it aim to solve?

Families that recently arrived from Ukraine and Russia, often aren’t able to afford to send their children to a summer camp. We give these kids the chance to enjoy a few weeks of summer camp in the beautiful Muskoka’s

When did you start/join it?

I started it in 2000

What made you want to get involved?

Since a teen, I have been involved in charity children’s camps. I wanted to give the kids arriving to Canada a chance to meet friends, develop their leadership skills, become familiarized with their faith, and enjoy having fun outdoors.

What was the situation like when you started?

When we started in 2000, we had very few facilities, and the camp was only 20 children.

How has it changed since?

We have since grown to 140 children, over two, 2 week sessions.

What more needs to be done?

We are expanding to a third session this summer. We need financial support to extend to a third session. All of our staff and counsellors are volunteers. Donations can be made at www.ruskoka.com or direct e-transfers to alex@ruskoka.com. We provide tax receipts for donations over $50.

How can our readers help?

Volunteer and donate!

Do you have any events coming up?

Also, every winter we run a charity fundraiser to support the camp, called Winter Palace Ball. Please attend and support Ruskoka Camp.

Where can we follow you?

Website

PAY IT FORWARD: What is an awesome local charity that you love?

The Toronto Star Fresh Air fund is a fantastic charity that helps many charitable camps across Ontario. Please support them.

The post Charitable Choices: Alex Sakuta of Ruskoka Camp appeared first on Toronto Guardian.

What is your business called and what does it do?

Visto.ai, a free platform for international students and skilled workers to navigate their Canadian immigration journey.

What made you want to do this work?

Immigration is a very stressful, confusing and difficult process, and there was no reliable, affordable solution for individuals looking for help.

What problem does this solve?

Navigating the Canadian immigration process without having to spend thousands of dollars on immigration lawyers or consultants

Who are your clientele/demographics?

Typically people in their 20s looking to study or immigrate to Canada for skilled work

How does your business make money? How does it work?

Visto offers paid but optional services in the free portal, including legal services, language test prep, career help and more

Where in Toronto can we find your profession?

We’re based out of the Legal Innovation Zone at Dundas Square

What is the best question a prospective customer could ask a member of your profession when comparing services? 

How many people have you helped with immigration applications?

Visto has helped more than 100.

What is the best part about what you do? What is the worst part?

Helping people start new lives in Canada.

Dealing with the bureaucracies and delays from Immigration Canada

What is your favourite joke about your own profession?

There’s a very common conception that most lawyers are pretty boring and non-tech savvy. I’m doing my best to try and change that

PAY IT FORWARD: What is another Toronto business that you love?

Flexday

The post Homegrown Business: Making the Immigration Process Easier with Visto appeared first on Toronto Guardian.

Let’s look beyond the fear mongering and conspiracy theories regarding the UN Compact on Migration, asylum seekers, and immigration itself.

The UN Compact on Migration is legally non-binding. It is based in the values of state sovereignty, responsibility-sharing, non-discrimination, and human rights. It recognizes the need for a cooperative approach to develop the benefits of migration, while mitigating the risks and challenges for individuals and for countries of origin and destination. It is a plan to address what is going to become or has become a worldwide problem. It is like developing a fire safety plan for a school, or a home but on a much larger scale.

The UN Compact on Migration is a necessary tool in helping to deal with the rising level of global migration. Right now there are 258 million migrants around the world living outside their country of birth. Without proper regulation it can overwhelm the infrastructure of host countries and lead to increasing levels of danger for the migrants themselves. Without this document there is vacuum in an issue that needs leadership from the world community, and needs leadership from Canadian politicians. For me it is simple. The world is changing, often for reasons beyond our control, we can either think and plan ahead proactively, or the costs can triple if we react and fail to plan.

In fact, Andrew Scheer was accused of lying about the UN Compact on Migration by a former Immigration Minister that he served with, Chris Alexander. There is no immigration or crisis regarding asylum seekers in Canada. There is zero proof to back that up.

Yes, refugee and immigration policies are separate, but the Conservative Party of Canada often conflate the two in an effort to pander to the low information voter.

It is perfectly legal to cross a border and initiate a refugee claim. In fact, this is what Canadian law demands of asylum seekers. Our own law stipulates that it’s not illegal to cross a border informally, as long as that person presents themselves to border services without delay. Border crossers are not committing an illegal act.

The 1951 UN Refugee Convention states that no signatory country will return a refugee seeking asylum “where they face serious threats to their life or freedom.” Refugees who present themselves are able to make a refugee claim. That is the guiding principle of Canadian immigration law. Something the Harper Government, of which Andrew Scheer was a senior member of, never once tried to change.

There is also no queue jumping. Asylum seekers are not displacing, or taking the place of an immigrant who applied to come to Canada through a formal process. Canada has a quota for the number of refugees it brings yearly, either through the private sponsorship program or the government assisted refugee program. The quota is not affected by the number of asylum claims that are made at the border, or through informal border crossings.

There is no illegal immigration. Repeat after me. PEOPLE ARE NEVER ILLEGAL. To claim otherwise is solely to dehumanize refugees or to sell a racial component to your argument. We cannot control the geopolitical and economic causes of migration, or that drive asylum claims – but we do have a duty to uphold our treaty obligations and international law.

Can someone explain to me how immigration being 0.816% of population in 2016, versus a projected 0.824% of population in 2018 constitutes a crisis in Canada? Immigration accounts for nearly all of Canada’s population growth right now, and by 2034 immigration will account for 100% of our net population growth. We require immigration for economic growth, GDP would fall without immigration. Immigration actually pays for itself and more.

A no-immigration, or lower immigration policy world would result in weak economic growth and fiscal strain—a situation that would reduce the motivation for private investment. Productivity-enhancing investments would not fully compensate for the negative impacts of a shrinking workforce. Our economy requires increasing levels of immigration to maintain population growth and to mitigate the negative consequences of our aging population and low birth rate.

Without immigration Canada’s potential economic growth would slow from 1.9% to an average of 1.3 % annually. In a no-immigration scenario, 26.9% of the population would be 65 and over by 2040.

Let’s look at productivity growth in relation to Canada’s economic growth, with and without immigration. Productivity growth is important because it is among the three components that allow Canada to increase its potential output and the living standard of its citizens. Potential output measures the highest sustainable level of real GDP that an economy can attain based on its productivity, labour supply, and capital stock (the total value of physical capital within an economy).

To help offset the negative economic and fiscal impacts of a shrinking labour force in a no-immigration/lower immigration scenario, Canada would need to rely more on productivity-enhancing capital investments to substitute workers. That would be impossible in the higher tax world it would take to maintain Canada’s social safety net without the adequate increase of immigration to maintain the financing of our social program spending.

This is where Conservative ideology falls apart. I am talking about 1%. The 1% scenario being used by the Trudeau government proposes that Canada will gradually increase its immigration levels over the coming decades to replenish its rising wave of retirees and to grow its labour force. Canada welcomed 300,000 immigrants in 2017, and Canada has set targets of welcoming 310,000 immigrants in 2018, 330,000 in 2019, and 340,000 in 2020, etc. Our immigration levels are at 0.824% – that is not only sustainable but also required. And that is what Conservatives are railing against: less than one percent of our population.

It is not hard to see why evangelical elements of the Conservative Party of Canada favor a no-immigration policy. It gives them an excuse to attack reproductive choice, it becomes an economic or population level debate as opposed to a debate on religious ideology alone. It allows Conservatives to view women as nothing but incubators for the purpose of procreation. It gives conservatives an excuse to promote the family unit as the only hope to grow population and delegitimize same sex marriage on the grounds that Andrew Scheer himself once used.

The evangelical conservative dream is to restrict women’s choice and even divorce itself.

We do not live in a post-fact society. For every bumper sticker slogan surrounding immigration from Conservative politicians, there are facts, statistics, and the human beings behind both. History will judge us on how we act regarding immigration.

(note: all numbers and graphs are from the Conference Board of Canada report, Imagining Canada’s Economy Without Immigration)

The post Conservative Myth Does Not Meet Reality On Immigration appeared first on Toronto Guardian.

Describe your charity/non-profit in a few sentences.

Where would you go if you had nothing and you knew no one? This is a question we ask people to ask themselves. Having nothing and knowing no one is often just the beginning of the barriers our residents face. Often times there is a language barrier. Refugee claimants are dealing with numerous issues—trauma that was experienced in their home country and on their journey to Canada, and often living with the anguish of leaving family behind.

Adam House provides refugee claimants with clean and safe living accommodations. The staff at Adam House provide assistance and advice with immigration procedures, primarily to our residents and former residents. We provide referrals to legal services, medical assistance, and community resources. However, Adam House is much more than shelter or the services we provide. Adam House is home. A place where residents find friendship and support-from our staff and each other. Adam House is also a place where refugee claimants can find hope for their future, as we pray with them through their difficulties, and celebrate their successes. We encourage our clients to contact us for continued support, even after they find permanent homes and move into the community.

What problem does it aim to solve?

We aim to solve the problem of homelessness amongst newly arrived refugee claimants in Toronto. We also provide immigration and settlement services so that our clients have the information and help they need to have the best chance of a positive decision regarding their refugee claim, and to settle well.

When did you start/join it?

I joined Adam House in February 2002, just after the building was purchased.

What made you want to get involved?

I wanted to get involved because I was excited about the opportunity to provide a warm welcome to Canada, for newcomers from around the world.

What was the situation like when you started?

When I first started at Adam House, the building had just been purchased and it took several months to renovate to suit our purposes and start providing housing for refugee claimants. There were almost 40,000 refugee claims made in Canada that year. Refugees stayed with us for 8 weeks maximum, and one of the first questions they asked us was, where they could buy a phone card.

How has it changed since?

The numbers of refugee claimants in Canada have gone up and down over the years, with the number as low as 11,000 in 2013, and back up over 40,000 in 2017. The changes are usually the result of legislative changes here in Canada, but can also be impacted by world events. Refugees now stay with us for 4 months, rather than 8 weeks. This is due to changes to the refugee claim process and the difficulty of finding affordable housing. Now one of the first questions they ask is, what is the Wi-Fi password.

What more needs to be done?

With the rise in numbers and the increased length of stay, we find we are turning away several refugee claimants each week. Many refugee claimants are unable to stay in refugee specific housing and are residing in homeless shelters, which is not appropriate shelter for refugee claimants who have already been traumatized by the situation in their home country, having to leave friends and family, and the journey to Canada. We need more refugee specific shelter space, and more affordable housing options in the city.

How can our readers help?

We are planning to open another home with more beds; however, we need financial resources. Readers can partner financially at our website. They can also contact us to see what gifts in kind we might be collecting at any given time.

Consider renting to a refugee or refugee family.

Do you have any events coming up?

We will be celebrating World Refugee Day with an International Food Fair on Sun, Jun 9, 2019.

Where can we follow you?
Twitter | Facebook | Website

The post Adam House charity provides safe living accommodations to refugees appeared first on Toronto Guardian.