OMSSA Speakers Series
2025 Speakers Series Signature Sponsor
OMSSA is pleased to announce Enbridge Gas as our 2025 Speakers Series Signature Sponsor.
Owned by Enbridge Inc., a Canadian-based leader in energy transportation and distribution, the Enbridge Gas Distribution and Storage business unit is comprised of five natural gas utilities that collectively provide safe, affordable, reliable energy to about 7 million customers in Ontario, Ohio, North Carolina, Quebec, Utah, Wyoming and Idaho.
Thank you to everyone who attended our Speakers Series webinars for 2024. We look forward to hosting several Speakers Series webinars in 2025. We hope you will be able to attend these webinars as we announce them.
OMSSA brings in guest speakers to discuss topics and issues you want to hear more about in the human services sectors. These webinars will be hosted by the Association.
There is no cost to attend this webinar, but registration is required. Please click on the registration link associated with each webinar to complete the process. Please note: Speakers and sessions are subject to change. Members who have questions can contact OMSSA at communications@omssa.com.
2025 Speakers Series Webinars
Working Together to Prevent and End Poverty and Increase Well-Being in Niagara
July 9, 2025
12:00 to 1:00PM
In March 2024, Niagara Region Council endorsed the Niagara Poverty Reduction Strategy. Recognizing that the Regional Municipality of Niagara and many local providers already deliver services to lift people out of poverty, this Strategy identifies best practice, uncovers gaps and leverages local knowledge to inform future action. Diverse perspectives and experiences shaped this community-owned Strategy. Over 1000 residents informed the Strategy including people living in poverty and over 200 Indigenous people.
During this session, the presenters will review the collective impact approach used to engage community and collaborate with many sectors to create the Strategy. They will outline the Strategy’s areas of focus, recommendations and actions. The presenters will describe the evaluation plan designed to measure success and reflect on highlights from the first year of implementation, including how the Strategy informed a regional grant funding program.
This presentation will be of interest for municipalities working to end poverty. Whether you're thinking of creating a poverty reduction strategy or looking for ways to enhance existing efforts, you’ll leave with insights and inspiration to engage community, monitor success and build collaborations that can work together to end poverty.
Moderator: Lori Watson, Director, Social Assistance & Employment Opportunities, Niagara Region
Lisa Gallant
Poverty Reduction Strategy Advisor
Niagara Region Community ServicesLisa Gallant is the Poverty Reduction Strategy Advisor at Niagara Region Community Services. In this role, she helped develop Niagara’s first official poverty reduction strategy and is working with interested and affected parties to implement actions identified in the strategy. Lisa brings skills in community engagement, program planning, evaluation and policy development. She values the importance of strengthening community capacity to advance efforts aimed at ending poverty.
Marc Todd
Manager, Social Assistance and Employment Opportunities
Niagara Region Community ServicesMarc Todd is a dedicated manager within the Niagara Region Community Services department, Social Assistance and Employment Opportunities (SAEO). Since 2008, he has played a pivotal role in overseeing the Niagara Prosperity Initiative (NPI), a grant program designed to enhance prosperity for residents of Niagara who are living in poverty. His commitment to addressing socio-economic challenges is reflected in his ongoing efforts to implement and advance the goals outlined in the Niagara Region Poverty Reduction Strategy.
Measuring What Matters: Creating A Meaningful Outcomes Framework Across 150 Programs
April 30, 2025
12:00 to 1:00PM
How do you create one outcomes framework for over 150 programs—each with different goals, services, and clients? In this session, we’ll take you behind the scenes of a major initiative led by the City of Toronto’s Social Development, Finance & Administration (SDFA) division to do exactly that.
Using a practical approach rooted in Results-Based Accountability and logic models, we’ll walk through how we developed a shared framework that captures meaningful outcomes across diverse areas like community safety, youth development, poverty reduction, and more. You’ll hear how we tackled the challenge of aligning front-line programs and central support units (like policy, analytics, and contract management) under a common structure—without losing what made each program unique.
We’ll show how this outcomes framework will help SDFA monitor progress, demonstrate value, and inform strategic decision-making through data that can be aggregated across programs.
Whether you're new to outcomes measurement or looking to scale your approach, you’ll leave with insights, an approach, and inspiration to build or improve your own outcomes framework—no matter the size of your organization.
Meg Gassanov
Founder and Principal Consultant
Strategic MeasuresMeg Gassanov is the Founder and Principal Consultant of Strategic Measures (www.strategicmeasures.ca), bringing over 15 years of expertise in evaluation and research. She has led impactful projects across sectors such as public health, homelessness, social assistance, disaster response, higher education, and youth development. Before establishing her consultancy, Meg held key roles at the City of Toronto, Windsor-Essex County Health Unit, McMaster University, and the University of Toronto. In addition to holding a PhD in Sociology from The Ohio State University, she is a certified Strategy Planning Professional and a Credentialed Evaluator.
Eden Williams
Policy Development Officer
City of TorontoEden Amare Williams is a Program Evaluator with over a decade of experience. She has worked at the City of Toronto for nearly seven years in various divisions, including Toronto Public Health, Toronto Shelter and Support Services, and Social Development, Finance and Administration. She has led evaluation projects within multiple types of social service settings, including the non-profit sector and municipal government. She has a reputation for amplifying the voices of marginalized populations when evaluating programs focused on the social determinants of health, diversity, equity, access, and inclusion. She also carries her lived experience as a Black woman into her evaluation practice through culturally-responsive methods. Eden excels at building organizational evaluation capacity, providing practical tools, and evidence-informed recommendations. Eden holds a Master of Health Evaluation degree from the University of Waterloo's School of Public Health Sciences. She also brings certification in project management and a Yellow Belt in Lean Six Sigma.
2024 Speakers Series Webinars
Institute on Municipal Finance & Governance Report: The Municipal Role in Child Care (POSTPONED)
Thank you for your interest in our Institute on Municipal Finance & Governance Report: The Municipal Role in Child Care Speakers Series webinar on October 9, 2024. Unfortunately, due to unforeseen circumstances, OMSSA will postpone this session.
In May 2024, the Institute on Municipal Finance & Governance at the University of Toronto released a report called "The Municipal Role in Child Care." This report is comprised of four key sections, each with separate authors outlining their vision for municipally-led child care. This session will bring together some of these authors to provide an overview of their analyses and an update on their work since the report was published. Their presentations will each focus on what they see as strengths and opportunities here in Ontario, including the unique role of municipal service system managers.
Drawing on the report, the speakers will provide analyses of international examples that Ontario can learn from, how different levels of government can better coordinate on implementing the Canada-Wide Early Learning and Child Care program, the advantages of municipally operated child care and its effects on staffing, and the municipal role in planning and building equitable and accessible child care. Additionally, the session will look at the future of municipally-led child care in Ontario, and will consider ways to move forward in light of the release of the province's new funding formula and the possibility of for-profit expansion in the system.
This session will be of interest to all members and partners working in municipal and not-for-profit child care, child care policy analysts, city planners, and more.
Please see our invited speakers and presenters.
Speakers:
- Moderator: Sonali Chakraborti, Manager of Programs and Research, Institute on Municipal Finance & Governance, University of Toronto
- Dr. Gordon Cleveland, Associate Professor Emeritus, Economics Department of Management, University of Toronto Scarborough, Member, National Advisory Council on Early Learning and Child Care
- Sue Colley, Co-Founder and Chair, Building Blocks for Child Care
- Carolyn Ferns, Public Policy and Government Relations Coordinator, Ontario Coalition for Better Child Care
- Martha Friendly, Executive Director, Childcare Resource and Research Unit
- Carley Holt, Principal Planner, City of Edmonton
A Look Ahead at Maytree's Annual Welfare in Canada Report (July 17, 2024)
Session Description and Resources
The annual Welfare in Canada report enumerates and examines the total welfare incomes of example households receiving social assistance in a given year and details some key features of social assistance programs, in all 13 provincial and territorial jurisdictions in Canada. As the only publicly available resource that compiles and analyses this data, Welfare in Canada is the primary source for evaluating Canada’s progress on fulfilling the human right to an adequate standard of living for households receiving social assistance.
Welfare in Canada was established by the Caledon Institute of Social Policy in 2012 to maintain and build on longitudinal data previously published by the National Council of Welfare in its Welfare Incomes reports. In 2018, Maytree assumed responsibility for updating the series and has added additional data and analysis over time.
Please note: the Welfare in Canada report is expected to be released at the end of July. This webinar offers a preview of the upcoming report.
Please see our invited speakers and presenters.
Speakers:
- Moderator: Stu Beumer, Director of Ontario Works, City of Hamilton
- Jennefer Laidley, Maytree Fellow
- Mohy Tabbara, Senior Policy Advisor
Resources and Recording:
- Welfare in Canada Report: https://maytree.com/changing-systems/data-measuring/welfare-in-canada/
- Webinar recording: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qXGVUKm83-Y
A Review of Homelessness Encampments Across Canada (February 29, 2024)
Session Description and Resources
Canada’s Federal Housing Advocate is a unique human rights accountability mechanism established to advance the right to adequate housing in Canada and monitor the National Housing Strategy. Located within the Canadian Human Rights Commission, the Advocate works to amplify the voices of people experiencing inadequate housing and homelessness and hold governments to account on their human rights obligations. In this session, we will introduce the right to housing and the Advocate’s mandate. The Session will include a brief overview of the Advocate’s mandate and discuss the Advocate’s final report and recommendations resulting from her national review of encampments, which has been be released on February 13, 2024.
Please see our invited speakers and presenters.
Speakers:
- Moderator: Kelly Goz, Manager (A), Homelessness Special Projects, Housing Hub, City of Windsor
- Jessica Losier, Data Research Analyst, Office of the Federal Housing Advocate
- Ruby Bissett, Data Research Analyst, Office of the Federal Housing Advocate
- Ian Hamilton, Senior Advisor, Office of the Federal Housing Advocate
- Emily Paradis, Senior Advisor, Office of the Federal Housing Advocate
- Catherine McKenney, Special Advisor, Engagement, Office of the Federal Housing Advocate
Resources
2023 Speakers Series Webinars
Continuing the Local Municipal Champion Conversation (August 24, 2023)
Building on our conversation at OMSSA's 2023 Exchange Conference, four of this year's Local Municipal Champion award recipients will tell the story of the programs that were developed for their communities, with particular emphasis on the successes they have seen and the challenges they have overcome. They will also answer the many questions attendees had as part of the discussion.
Please see our invited speakers and presenters.
Speakers:
- Moderator: Brian Marks, Chief Administrative Officer, Cochrane District Social Services Administration Board
- Kelly Goz, Coordinator, Housing Administration & Development, City of Windsor
- Kristine Haines-Chiarello, Manager (A), Employment and Social Services Central, Community and Social Services, City of Ottawa
- Ian Hanney, Supervisor, Homelessness Prevention and Social Planning, County of Lambton
- Whitney Kitchen, Coordinator, Housing Administration & Development, City of Windsor
- Jennifer Lible, Manager, Social Assistance Programs, District of Thunder Bay Social Services Administration Board
Member Housing and Homelessness Initiatives Discussion (August 18, 2023)
This session will bring together OMSSA Members to discuss the initiatives they've designed to address the current challenges in housing and homelessness. We'll hear from a spectrum of Members on, but not limited to, the following issues:
- How has homelessness changed since the pandemic, as well as in the last year?
- How has the Waterloo encampment decision changed the approach to homelessness in your area?
- What work are you doing to connect housing and health?
Please see our invited speakers and presenters.
Speakers:
- Moderator: Al Fletcher, Manager, Investment in Affordable Housing/Neighbourhood Development at the City of Hamilton
- Abigail Bond, Executive Director of the Housing Secretariat, City of Toronto
- Nicole Cortese, Manager of Homelessness Operations, Regional Municipality of Niagara
- Lisa McIntosh, Director of Income Employment and Homelessness, Regional Municipality of Durham
- Tyler Venable, Manager, Housing Services, District of Nipissing Social Services Administration Board
Implementing CWELCC in Ontario (July 13, 2023)
Session Description and Resources
This webinar will explore the current implementation of the Canada-Wide Early Learning & Child Care Program (CWELCC). Attendees will hear our guest speakers share their insights on the implementation of CWELCC in Ontario. Please see our invited speakers and presenters.
Speakers:
- Moderator: Satinder Klair, Director, Children's Services, Regional Municipality of Niagara
- Dr. Gordon Cleveland, Consultant Economist, President of Cleveland Consulting: Early Childhood Education and Care Inc.
- Beth Deazeley, LL.B., Registrar and CEO, College of Early Childhood Educators
- Kim Hiscott, RECE, Executive Director, Andrew Fleck Children's Services
Resources