Montgomery Sisam dedicated contributor to Corporate Volunteer Program

Montgomery Sisam Inc. is known around CAMH for being part of the Community Care Consortium that is working on the Facilities Master plan and design for the Queen Street Redevelopment. But they’re also lending a hand to the Corporate Volunteer Program.

(L-R) Carolyn Shim, CAMH Addiction Medicine Service, with Rosie Dawson and Geordon Green of Montgomery Sisam, whose staff have done five volunteering stints serving clients of the program’s Breakfast Club. They are joined by Beverly Clarke, AMS Resource Room staff.

On August 25 and 27th corporate volunteers from Montgomery Sisam Architects Inc. joined staff of the Addiction Medicine Service to prepare and serve breakfast to clients of the program’s Breakfast Club. This marks the 5th volunteer event that Montgomery Sisam has participated in since the Corporate Volunteer program started in August 2007.

The Breakfast Club has been running out of the Addiction Medicine Service Resource Room since September 2003, where it started out serving breakfast to the Addiction Medicine Service clients only. Over the years the demand for this service has necessitated the club’s expansion to include all CAMH clients. Simple breakfasts of toast, cereal, fruit, beverages including tea and coffee are served the last full week of each month, which is the time many clients, who rely on social assistance or have low incomes, run out of funds and cannot afford to eat.

CAMH staff began to notice that clients who began participating in the Breakfast Club, and in turn other programs in and out of the Resource Room have begun to function at a higher level in many areas of their lives. They also reported improvements in their self-esteem and in mental health and addiction issues in general.

Phil Goodfellow (L) and Matt Galvin of Montgomery Sisam with CAMH Corporate Volunteer Program Coordinator Jim Davey.

Beverley Clarke and Carolyn Shim, Case workers in the Resource Room thanked Geordon, Rosie, Phil and Matt of Montgomery Sisam for choosing to return to the Breakfast Club a second time to prepare and serve scrambled eggs, blueberry pancakes bacon and other tasty breakfast items to the clients and for donating breakfast items to the Breakfast club.

Everyone present was most impressed with the ease in which the Geordon, Rosie, Phil and Matt interacted with clients and staff, says Jim Davey, Coordinator of CAMH’s Corporate Volunteer Program. “We commend Montgomery Sisam for the amazing group of employees who are not afraid to show our clients that they care and want to make a difference in their lives,” he adds.