Frontline Workers' Collective

Frontline work is an essential component of social and emergency services. It’s work we’re passionate about that’s deeply rooted in social justice and community development. Frontline work saves lives, brings us together, and empowers our communities.

This is an original illustration generously donated for use by the Frontline Workers’ Collective by Justice Waltz. @justi_ 

The work can also be exhausting, chaotic, and overwhelming. Frontline workers are first responders in the opioid crisis and housing crisis we’re currently experiencing in Toronto.

We are often the first point of contact for people going through mental health crises. Because we care deeply for the people we serve and those we work beside, we are deeply affected by what they’re going through.

Many of us are navigating our own mental health, financial, job security, or other challenges.

Our collective seeks to do the following with our members:

-provide education and specialized training that empowers us to better serve our community members as well as addressing our own needs as service providers with issues such as “burn out”,  compassion fatigue, and vicarious trauma 

-curate events that foster community building, sharing and networking for our members

-help build emotional resiliency through community healing and knowledge building

We recognize that we work and live on land that is the traditional territory of the Huron-Wendat, the Haudenosaunee, and the Missisaugas of the Credit River. This land was the subject of the Dish With One Spoon Wampum made between the Iroquois Confederacy, and the Confederacy of the Ojibwe and allied nations to share and care for the Great Lakes region in peace. We strive to decolonize the work that we do and acknowledge the strong peer support work being done in First Nations communities. Many community work practices draw from First Nations traditions in their efforts to support people holistically and heal using a relationship-oriented approach.