Quarterly Report on The Redwood’s Community Reestablishment Expansion Project

The Bras Family Foundation

I am writing to you today with our quarterly report on the progress of The Redwood’s Community Reestablishment Expansion Project, which is currently being supported by an $18,000 grant from the Bras Family Foundation.

As we shared with you in our quarterly report of December 2007, we’ve been able to significantly increase the original scope of the project due to an 18 month grant from the Women’s Program Status of Women Canada, and the generous assistance of the Bras Family Foundation.

In addition to the expansion of Community Reestablishment service delivery, including counseling, housing and legal support, advocacy and referrals, and employment readiness training as outlined in our original proposal to you, we have also been able to implement the following additional Community Re-establishment Expansion initiatives:

• Establishing an Advisory Committee comprised of former residents of The Redwood, who assist The Redwood in designing and delivering our services so they most effectively meet the needs of women and children living with violence.
• Introducing a Leadership Development program for women who are regaining control of their lives from domestic abuse.
• Expanding outreach efforts to raise awareness.
• Training women participating in the program to deliver outreach and awareness raising workshops. 
• Developing and implementing a “Train the Trainer” workshop to raise abuse awareness among community workers and law students.

One of the greatest highlights to date in 2008 has been the growth of our outreach efforts – between January 1 and June 30, your support has enabled The Redwood to:

• Provide workshops to raise awareness about domestic abuse and violence against women with close to 500 participants.
• Train and support four participants in our Leadership Development Program and Advisory Committee to begin co-facilitating our community and “Train the Trainer” workshops.
• Partner with 15 agencies, including COSTI Immigrant Services, Urban Alliance on Race Relations, and Parkdale Project Read, to help connect families with the services The Redwood provides. 
• Work with the Toronto Police Service Divisions 11 & 13 to design training workshops on Domestic Violence/Abuse to be presented to new recruits.

Best wishes,

Anne-Marie Gardner

Executive Director