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Seniors Celebrate Launch of Illahee Community Connection

On November 27, 2006, FSA Toronto’s Community and Neighbourhood Development Unit officially launched the Illahee Community Connection (ICC) initiative for seniors from Iranian, Somali and Tamil communities of Scarborough and North York.

The launch was meant to be ceremonial and certainly it was: people poured into the Scarborough Civic Centre (SCC) for the joyous event. One hundred and twenty five invitations had gone out. That number of seniors arrived and then some. A few quick dashes out for extra refreshments were required, and still the seniors kept coming. Word of mouth and enthusiasm doubled the expected numbers as the SCC Council Chamber filled for a celebration of the first order. Each and every guest was well fed; the diligent volunteers made certain of that.

Partners, service providers, community leaders and FSA Toronto staff joined the seniors for the festivities. Then-Executive Director of FSA Toronto, Yves Savoie, cut a cake for the occasion. Mayor David Miller and Ontario Minister of Health George Smitherman sent messages of congratulations. Scarborough city counsellors Michael Thompson, Raymond Cho and Glenn De Baeremaeker also attended the event and brought warm wishes on behalf of the city council and their communities.

The seniors provided the entertainment for the Illahee Community Connection launch. Tamil and Iranian music, dance demonstrations and a fashion show of Tamil ethnic attire enchanted the spectators.

ICC was developed by Family Service Association of Toronto to create new opportunities for partnerships, community development and services for seniors after the closure of the Illahee Lodge program. Illahee is a Native American word, adopted by the very first settlers to North America. It means "place of rest" or "good land". This meaning was very apt as applied to Illahee Lodge, a facility located in Cobourg, Ontario. For fifty years, FSA Toronto ran Illahee Lodge as a summer recreational getaway for seniors. The program was closed at the end of 2004 when it became too cost prohibitive to maintain the building year round for three summer months of activities.

From the loss of one facility grew the concept of Illahee Community Connection. Now Illahee is a word connoting a place of welcome in the community for the most recent of newcomers in Scarborough and North York.

"Illahee Community Connection’s purpose," said Naga Ramalingam, ICC Coordinator, "is to build capacity for underserved, marginalized communities in Scarborough and North York." An important aim is to reduce isolation among seniors from the Tamil, Somali and Iranian communities with which FSA Toronto has a rich history and strong collaborative relationships. Plans are currently underway to include Afghan seniors as part of ICC starting in March 2007.

Unlike Illahee Lodge, ICC is local, available year round and mobile in its outreach. Workshops and other events will be held for each of the three communities in their own languages at locations that are convenient, where the groups are most populous.

ICC activities are developed based on the input received from seniors who participated in an extensive survey carried out in February and March 2006. Priorities expressed by the seniors included: educational workshops on health and safety concerns, life skills, arts and crafts, transportation, recreational outings and day trips to get away from it all. Workshops on health topics planned for 2007 include arthritis, heart disease, diabetes, breast cancer and prostate cancer.

As Ramalingam said of the ICC ceremonial launch, "Clapping together, dancing together, singing together, appreciating each other’s culture is a good idea, a great idea. The ICC launch achieved one of the hallmarks of the program – bringing people together and satisfying the need they were expressing!"

The seniors filled the buses provided by FSA Toronto to attend the ICC launch. Extra vans made return trips to bring all the seniors. Some arrived by their own means. But they all came because they value Illahee Community Connection as theirs, as a program in which they have ownership.

For more information about the Illahee Community Connection program and the upcoming health and wellness workshops, please contact Naga Ramalingam, Community Development Worker and ICC Program Coordinator by phone:  416-586-9777 ext. 438 or by email: nagara@fsatoronto.com

by Jane Schmidt

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