Messages From Hamilton Virtual TBTN 2020 Community Partners

Some of our Com­mu­ni­ty Part­ners from TBTN2020 have addi­tion­al mes­sage for the com­mu­ni­ty here! 

Mis­sion Ser­vices (Inas­much House and Willow’s Place):

Mis­sion Ser­vices of Hamil­ton is a non-prof­it, mul­ti-social ser­vice agency who believes every per­son deserves access to healthy food, safe hous­ing, and oppor­tu­ni­ties for tomor­row. We have two major pro­grams avail­able for women.

Inas­much House is a shel­ter for women (with or with­out chil­dren in their care) expe­ri­enc­ing abuse or home­less­ness. Our ser­vices include sup­port for chil­dren and youth, legal advo­ca­cy, and Learn­ing Effec­tive Anti-Vio­lence in Fam­i­lies (LEAF). In addi­tion to our 24-hour cri­sis line, dur­ing the pan­dem­ic we launched Text Inas­much, a tex­ting and web chat plat­form to pro­vide women with more options to reach out to us for help and sup­port. You can learn more at www​.mis​sion​-ser​vices​.com/​i​n​a​s​m​u​c​h​-​house.

Cri­sis line: 905−528−8600

Text line: 289−212−6399

Willow’s Place is a low-bar­ri­er day­time resource hub at 196 Went­worth Street North for women expe­ri­enc­ing home­less­ness and hous­ing pre­car­i­ty. Our ser­vices include access to meals, show­ers and laun­dry, harm reduc­tion sup­plies, tran­si­tion­al hous­ing sup­port, and com­mu­ni­ty refer­rals. Dur­ing the pan­dem­ic we have extend­ed our hours to sev­en days per week, 9 am to 8 pm. We are cur­rent­ly focus­ing on serv­ing women who are expe­ri­enc­ing absolute home­less­ness, and are offer­ing take-out meals and phone sup­port to women who are pre­car­i­ous­ly housed. You can learn more at www​.mis​son​-ser​vices​.com/​w​i​l​l​o​w​s​-​place.

Mohawk Col­lege:

We’re here to sup­port you! If you’re a mem­ber of the Mohawk Col­lege com­mu­ni­ty, and have ques­tions about the sup­ports avail­able to you, let us know. Email us at consent@​mohawkcollege.​ca or counselling@​mohawkcollege.​ca or for more infor­ma­tion. You are not required to dis­close or report sex­u­al vio­lence in order to access sup­ports and services. 

YWCA Hamil­ton:

YWCA Hamil­ton is a proud spon­sor of the Vir­tu­al Take Back the Night event and a long­time part­ner in SACHA’s cru­cial work to end vio­lence against women and oppres­sion in all its forms. At its core, YWCA Hamil­ton is a fem­i­nist orga­ni­za­tion with a mis­sion to strength­en women’s and girls’ voic­es, broad­en their choic­es, build dynam­ic lead­er­ship, and pro­vide essen­tial and mean­ing­ful ser­vices that pro­mote safe, inclu­sive and equi­table com­mu­ni­ties. We have been doing this work for over 130 years, and while there has been great progress, we know there is still a long way to go. The glob­al pan­dem­ic has changed all of our lives, but in many ways, it has impact­ed women most deeply – espe­cial­ly women from mar­gin­al­ized com­mu­ni­ties, many of whom were already fac­ing vio­lence, racism, eco­nom­ic inse­cu­ri­ty, and sys­temic oppres­sion.
YWCA Hamil­ton stands in sol­i­dar­i­ty with all sur­vivors and we are com­mit­ted to dis­man­tling the struc­tures that uphold vio­lence and oppres­sion, while envi­sion­ing new and bet­ter sys­tems for the future. Through our work in women’s hous­ing, youth ser­vices,
employ­ment, advo­ca­cy, and strong com­mu­ni­ty part­ner­ships, we will reimag­ine what’s pos­si­ble, resist lim­i­ta­tions, and rebuild with pur­pose and hope. We are not look­ing for a ​“return to nor­mal” – but rather, we are aim­ing to build a new nor­mal, root­ed in safe­ty, equal­i­ty and jus­tice for all.
For more infor­ma­tion about our pro­grams, find us online:
ywc​a​hamil​ton​.org (web)
@YWCA_Hamilton (twit­ter)
@ywcahamilton (Insta­gram)
Let’s Take Back the Night togeth­er.
#TBT­NReimag­ineRe­sistRe­build

The AIDS Network: 

Like many orga­ni­za­tions we are very eager to return to work­ing out of our office and meet­ing spaces. How­ev­er, we are choos­ing to con­tin­ue exer­cis­ing an abun­dance of cau­tion, and will not be re-open­ing our phys­i­cal spaces to the pub­lic at this time. We will con­tin­ue to offer our adapt­ed HIV sup­port, harm reduc­tion and edu­ca­tion pro­grams as out­lined, and will con­tin­ue to mon­i­tor the sit­u­a­tion for the time being. We rec­og­nize that our phys­i­cal office loca­tions are impor­tant, safe spaces for the peo­ple we help, and we are all eager to return to our reg­u­lar pro­grams and ser­vices for peo­ple liv­ing with, affect­ed by and vul­ner­a­ble to HIV in Hamil­ton, Hal­ton, Haldimand, Nor­folk and Brant when we feel it is safe to do so. Our harm reduc­tion out­reach has con­tin­ued with­out inter­rup­tion through com­mu­ni­ty out­reach as well as our mobile van pro­gram in part­ner­ship with The City of Hamil­ton. Our van pro­gram has added addi­tion­al ser­vice in the after­noon while con­tin­u­ing the evening out­reach. Indi­vid­u­als can con­tin­ue to reach out to our van pro­gram at 905−317−9966 for harm reduc­tion sup­plies as well as nalox­one. Our HIV sup­port team are avail­able for client intakes, case man­age­ment and sup­port remote­ly and in-per­son. In-per­son sup­port is by appoint­ment only. If you need sup­port in Hamil­ton con­tact Kel­ly Rat­tray – Sup­port Work­er support@​aidsnetwork.​ca, she will also con­nect you with sup­port in oth­er regions, if request­ed. Com­mu­ni­ty devel­op­ment and edu­ca­tion ini­tia­tives through our pri­or­i­ty pop­u­la­tion net­work pro­grams (Gay Men’s Sex­u­al Health, Women and HIV/AIDS Ini­tia­tive, and African and Caribbean Coun­cil on HIV/AIDS in Ontario) are being con­duct­ed vir­tu­al­ly.
For more infor­ma­tion, please vis­it www​.aid​snet​work​.ca