On October 1st, the FMTA and Law Foundation of Ontario launched the
Connecting Communities Tenant School. The School is a two year project
being done in conjunction with Thorncliffe Neighbourhood Office, Rexdale
Women's Centre and the Working Women's Community Center.

For the last two years the FMTA ran a very successful series of pilot tenant
school projects. The workshops were facilitated by the FMTA and presented by
staff lawyers of various legal aid clinics in Toronto.

How successful were they? The schools were overwhelmingly well received and
a great majority said that they would take the information back to their
communities so that they could help other tenants.

The Connecting Communities Tenant School will provide settlement workers who
work with newcomers to Canada with in-depth training in tenant law and
thereby increase the access to justice for these extremely vulnerable
tenants.

The school will be held over a two year period, with the first school slated
for January 2013 with the last "term" in August-September 2014. Like the
previous tenant schools there will be five (5) workshops of two hours each.

Connecting Communities Tenant School is an exciting and innovative program
that will expand the FMTA's outreach and is perfectly in keeping with what
we have always been doing: Empowering tenants through education and
information of their legal rights as tenants.

Together we are Strong!

For more information please contact Howard Tessler, Tenant School
Coordinator at [email protected]. or 416-413-9442.