The Children's StorefrontA Meeting Place for Parents and Children

Capital One Canada steps forward with donation to kick-start their fundraising campaign

Toronto, ON (May 31, 2010) – The Children’s Storefront has found a new home so it can continue to provide GTA parents and their families with the open arm welcome and support that the community values so closely. 

The Children’s Storefront is grateful to Capital One Canada for stepping forward with a generous $40,000 donation, with the offer to match community donations up to an additional $40,000, to help them rebuild.

“The fire completely gutted our home and left nothing behind for the kids to play with or the parents to learn from,” said Roona Maloney, Executive Director, The Children’s Storefront.  “Thanks to Capital One, our fundraising campaign is off to a good start, but we desperately need the community to step up to help rebuild our centre.  We also welcome volunteers to help with all areas of construction, including meal preparation, painting and cleaning.”

 “The devastation faced by The Children’s Storefront is a real loss to the community.  As a strong supporter of local initiatives that help GTA-kids succeed in life, we wanted to kick start their fundraising campaign,” said Laurel Ostfield, spokesperson, Capital One Canada.  “We are hopeful the community will step forward to help The Children’s Storefront raise the necessary funds to rebuild this important parent-child centre.”

To turbo-charge the fundraising effort, Capital One Canada will match all community donations made to The Children’s Storefront by September 30, 2010 up to $40,000.  This is on top of the $40,000 donation already made, for a total of $80,000.

The new location will be housed at 826 Bloor Street West.  It boasts bright, open spaces, and is located in close proximity to both parks and public transportation. The square footage of the new Children’s Storefront will increase thanks to a second floor, two kitchens and two bathrooms.  

“The most exciting addition to our programming will be a separate basement kitchen which we will use to enhance our brunches, dinners and community events.  We hope to be able to work with public health and other agencies to grow this into a community kitchen with its own workshops and programming,” said Ms. Maloney.

The Children’s Storefront was destroyed by fire on October 31, 2009. Toronto’s oldest parent-child service centre lost all of its games, toys and resource material that had been painstakingly collected over 30 years of operation.

Donations to The Children’s Storefront can be made at:

TD Canada Trust

Transit Number13602

Account#05425206664

Or use paypal online at www.childrensstorfront.com

About The Children’s Storefront

Established over 30 years ago, the Children’s Storefront is a community driven family resource centre. We offer support services, free of charge, and welcome families of all cultural and socio-economic backgrounds. Our mission is to be of service to all parents and caregivers with young children.

The Children’s Storefront began as a toy-lending library and quickly grew to become a safe haven for parents with small children to come together and share their parenting experiences.  Young children can learn how to play together in a warm and child-centered environment while parents bond with each other over shared stories in a supportive and non-judgmental arena.

About Capital One
Located in Toronto, Ontario, Capital One has offered Canadian consumers a range of competitive MasterCard credit cards since 1996, when the company first introduced the Platinum MasterCard in Canada. Capital One Canada is a division of Capital One Bank, a subsidiary of Capital One Financial Corporation of McLean, Virginia (NYSE: COF). Capital One is committed to the community and to helping youth through our business and nonprofit partnerships and through the skills and dedication of our talented associates.

Media Contact:

Roona Maloney

Executive Director, The Children’s Storefront

416-531-8151

roonamaloney@hotmail.com

Our new location will be at 826 Bloor Street West (the north-east corner of Shaw and Bloor).

We want to thank everyone for all of the support that you have provided since our fire on October 31. We are still here and able to plan a future because of the tremendous support of our community.

We have had design assistance from Adam Thom, a wonderful architect who came forward to get us up and running again after the fire. Thanks to Adam, we have some great designs for our new site.

We know that many people in the community have expressed interest in helping in some additional ways and we asked everyone to wait until there was a new Storefront to build. Well, that day has finally arrived and we need your help.

We need help with all areas of construction – from sweeping, meal preparation, drywall, painting and building on- and off-site. We welcome skilled volunteers and eager volunteers to make our new home a reality.

We took possession of the building on the 7^th of May and we hope to start work soon. There is a process of permit applications and other tasks that will need to happen before the actual building can begin, but we are getting close!

I am asking everyone to take a moment and think of some areas that you are able to help with, the time you are able to commit and the things you are most interest in helping us do.  If you have friends or family members that might be interested, please include them too!

Suzanne Landriault is our volunteer coordinator and is waiting to hear from all of you.  I know that many of you have already given so much but we still need your help. We need your to help rebuild The Children’s Storefront back into the wonderful home that it was for our community.

If you need any additional information or have any questions please feel free to contact us at childrensstorefront@gmail.com

With much appreciation,

Roona Maloney

Executive Director,

Children’s Storefront

The Childrens’s Storefront is operating out of St. Alban’s Monday to Friday, 9:30-2:00 p.m.   St. Alban’s have generously given us space as a temporary location until we find our new home.

For more than thirty years, the Children’s Storefront has been an icon in the community – a place where families can “drop in” and find the support they need in an environment that is both welcoming and non-judgmental. As the first child-parent centre in Ontario, the Storefront paved the way for many of the free programs now in existence.
The central role of the Children’s Storefront has been to provide support for parents and young children. Since 1975, the Storefront has been the place where children could come and learn how to play together in a warm and child-centered environment, while at the same time, parents and caregivers could bond with each other and share stories about themselves in a supportive environment. Unlike nursery schools, daycares or counselling facilities, adults and children are served together in the same program.
History
In 1974 a Local Initiative Program grant was used to create a daytime setting for parents and preschoolers to come together using play and toy-making as the medium of communication and interaction. A toy-lending centre was established; there were toy-making workshops, including puppetry, for parents and children, and a daytime space for adults and children was created. The program evolved as parents and children came to borrow toys and stayed to chat — building relationships of mutual support. Lessons learned from this experience led to the creation of the Children’s Storefront.

The Children’s Storefront opened in January 1975 in a corner store at the intersection of Bathurst and Olive streets. Founded and staffed by Ryva Novick and Maryann Schwartz, the location provided a convenient place for people in the community to drop in according to their daily schedule. There is no structured programming at the Storefront, which means that everyone is welcome at any time. No one is ever late because their child slept in (or did not sleep) or because they have errands, appointments or work to do. For parents adapting to the needs of their young children, this kind of “scheduling” is welcomed with open arms.
The location on a main artery was chosen for its proximity to transit and its street-level appeal, making it inviting and inclusive to anyone passing by with babies or young children. These considerations were also pivotal in the choice of the Storefront’s second location at 1079 Bathurst Street in 1987.

Having never charged for its services, the Storefront’s mission has always been to be accessible to all families with young children. Run on a shoe-string budget, available monies have been carefully and deliberately spent on children’s literature and timeless toys. Fundraising has always been a very small part of the budget; and for the most part, fundraising efforts have been supported by users of the Storefront past and present, and donations from local business.

After a tragic fire led to the demolition of the building at 1079 Bathurst St. on October 31, 2009, the Children’s Storefront lost its premises and entire contents. The Storefront is rebuilding and reaching out to the community that it has served for many years. Founders Ryva Novick and Maryann Schwartz were pioneers in this field, and the Storefront’s goal is to continue their work.