|
|
 |
| Home | Issues | About Us | Contact Us |
Paulos Gebreyesus, UNISON
Please tell us the story of Paulos Gebreyesus and the key moments that shaped you career path?
I started my professional career as a settlement counsellor at Canadian African Newcomer Aid Centre of Toronto (CANACT). During this time, I began to understand the important work that HIV/AIDS service organizations and other health care providers deliver in Toronto. I met a newcomer living with HIV/AIDS who needed support with his living arrangements but only spoke Tigrinya or Amharic. None of the AIDS organizations had staff or volunteers who spoke those languages and because I spoke those languages, I wanted to be trained and began to volunteer. I learned so much from the people around me, some who were living with HIV/AIDS and others who were there to support others. Although it was challenging, I gained a very strong community through this work and I am still active in HIV/AIDS prevention and support work. In 2000, I joined the Lawrence Heights Community Health Centre to coordinate the Injection Drug Use (IDU) Outreach Project. The IDU project uses a Harm Reduction approach to to reduce HIV/AIDS risk to communities in and around Lawrence Heights. Along with my supervisor and other staff, we worked with people in the community to come together, share information and strategies to reduce health risks from substance use and unprotected sex . As a Harm Reduction outreach worker, I spent most of my time in the neighbourhoods in and around e eLawrence Heights and began to understand much more how difficult it was for many people to keep themselves healthy. Problems like unsafe neighbourhoods, poverty, social isolation, and unemployment prevent many people from living healthier lives. In 2004, after four years of Harm Reduction and street outreach, I became the Program Director for Community Health Promotion. In this new role, I supported our Community Health Centre in planning, developing and evaluating programs and services and to strengthen partnerships with other agencies. Most importantly, I continued to learn from residents and clients about different community and health issues they faced including immigration and refugee issues, supporting their children through school, parenting, diabetes, substance use, nutrition, and trying to get individual and family counselling support. This was all very exciting and important but at the same time Lawrence Heights, like many other neighbourhoods in Toronto, was suffering from gun violence. In fact, one of my closest co-workers in Lawrence Heights, Paul Watson, was killed senselessly in 2002. In the summer of 2005, after many shootings, Unison along with Toronto Community Housing and City of Toronto staff we called a community meeting to hear what residents and agency staff thought we should do to improve community safety. During that meeting we heard from residents that agencies needed to come together as one to work at the major issues in the neighbourhood such as policing and safety, housing and tenancy issues, and youth supports and programs. This led us to build the Lawrence Heights Interorganization Network (LHION) which today has over 30 agencies that actively participate in coordinating services to the Lawrence Heights neighbourhood. At LHION, nine diffe e e rent working groups each meet monthly to plan, deliver and evaluate services on community-identified areas of focus such as education, community safety, and Revitalization. You can learn more about LHION at www.lhion.org After 10 years working in Lawrence Heights, I am in a new role as Senior Director, Community and Health Promotion Services at Unison Health and Community Services. I now work out of our location at Keele-Rogers but I am also very active in other Unison sites as well.
Please tell us the history of UNISON Health & Community Services?
Unison Health and Community Services is a non-profit, community-based organization. We serve communities across North York and former city of York – including Bathurst Finch, Lawrence Heights and Weston-Mt Dennis.. We provide free health and community services. We focus on providing services to people who usually experience difficulty accessing services – including newcomers. Unison Health and Community Services was formed by a voluntary merger of New Heights Community Health Centres and York Community Services in 2010. While both organizations have their own unique history spanning over 35 years, they also shared a common goal of building healthy communities. v At Unison we strive to: • Engage residents through high quality accessible health and community services. With four full-service locations, Unison is now serving over 22,000 clients and offers core services that include primary health care (including family doctors and nurses), counselling, health promotion, early years programs, legal services, harm reduction programs, housing assistance and adult protective services as well as special programs like Pathways to Educations, Diabetes Education and Prevention and Aging at Home.
What is the vision for the UNISON Health & Community Services and how do you position your Agency to operationally this vision?
Unison is a place where newcomers and other community members can get free health services with or without OHIP. They can also access our many other free programs and services. As part of our commitment to making our services accessible we offer free interpretation services for our one-on-one appointments and childcare for our group programs. We have 8 program and service areas: 1. Health Programs and Services are provided by a team of doctors, nurse practitioners, community health nurses, dietitians and chiropodists (foot doctors). This team provides a full family practice including pregnancy and infant programs, nutrition counselling, preventive health care and health education. Many of Unison’s programs and services are open to new clients – please call the site nearest you for more information.
The city of Toronto is changing demographically, what is your strategic direction to deal with diversity and changing population trends in service provision? Is your Agency sensitive to the particular needs of diverse populations and what service provisions do you put in place in meeting their needs?
Unison has put a lot of work into making sure we respond to the needs of the communities we serve. One great example is our community environmental scan. This scan involves a multi-stage research process to determine community needs and how to best meet these needs. As part of the scan we have collected over 850 surveys from community residents asking them to rank their top community service needs. We have also conducted focuse e groups with over 100 participants to gather in-depth knowledge of needs of residents including youth, seniors, parents and service providers. In our research we made every effort to get opinions from a variety of people living across our catchment. The environmental scan report will be available in April. Unison’s board will use it to set our strategic framework which will allow us to focus on the needs of the community in our programs and services. If you want more information about the scan please contact Jen Quinlan at jen.quinlan@unisonhcs.org or 416 787 1676 ext 255. Or check our website at www.unisonhcs.org
Is UNISON a safe, friendly and fun place for youth? Are there any workshops designed to help young people be fit, active, healthy, happy and safe?
Unison provides a variety of programs and services for families and youth. In particular, our Lawrence Heights site is well known for its Pathways to Education program. This program is available at no cost to students living in the Lawrence Heights and Neptune Drive communities. We work with high school students in Grades 9, 10, 11 and 12 to help them improve school attendance and academic achievement and to develop career options. Since Pathways began in 2007 the grade 9 attainment rate (successfully completing 7 or more credits) went from 61.5% to 81.5%. And the TDSB defined ‘high risk’ grade 9 students (those with 6 or fewer credits) went from 38.5% to 18.5%. Pathways provides the following student supports: For more information on Pathways please contact the office at 416 787 1676 ext 245. In addition to Pathways to Education, Unison provides programs for families. These programs include Early Years programs, Prenatal Nutrition Programs and pregnancy and parenting support programs. We also provide a childcare training program for adults interested in gaining childcare skills. Check out our website for more information on these programs: www.unisonhcs.org What are the challenges and opportunities that UNISON Health &
Unison Health and Community Services has a specific focus on serving people who face barriers to accessing health and social services – including newcomers. As part of our commitment to serve this group we do the following: • Provide free health and community services for people with or without OHIP In addition, Unison is very active in many neighbourhood networks, and provides leadership in two networks. The Lawrence Heights Inter-Organizational Network (LHION) and the Bathurst Finch Network (BFN) both work towards connecting residents and service providers. These networks bring people together to work on common issues and needs and to advocate on behalf of the neighbourhoods. Residents of these neighbourhoods are welcome to get involved in the networks.
Contact:
Of course, there are always challenges when trying to decrease barriers to accessing health and social services. We have identified a few common barriers to serving the communities where we work, including: • Lack of information about our programs and services in the community. If people don’t know about our services they cannot take advantage of them. • There is big demand for finding a doctor and other medical services for family and individual health and we cannot always provide these services for everyone who needs that care. We continue to work with our partners and funders to provide this care for everyone • Many problems that people have are related to government policy, for example, charging fees for recreation and sports programs by the city. We know that people need these programs to keep themselves healthy but many cannot afford to pay. We support our community members in advocacy so that we have healthier families and communities. If you are interested in learning more about Unison or to become a member please visit our website at www.unisonhcs.org. You can also subscribe to our e-bulletins by clicking on ‘Subscribe’ at the top of the web page and by entering your name and email address. We also encourage you to drop by any of our sites for more information on programs and services in your neighbourhood! Contact us at:
Paulos Gebreyesus, UNISON A Conversation with Muse Kulow To feature your organization contact at ; admin@immigrantpost.ca
Muse Kulow, Publisher
|
