History
A History of Service
Originally called the Downtown Churchworkers’ Association, the organization was founded by Canon R.J. Moore in 1912, an Anglican Minister, to address the needs of Toronto’s families living in the downtown slums at the turn of the century. Robert Moore and his volunteers designed and ran programs that addressed the practical necessities of life for these families. They provided coal, food, clothing, Christmas help and even supplied a much-needed trip to the country to relieve the grinding poverty, disease and hopelessness of slum dwelling.
Evolving to Meet Changing Need
Over the years, the organization’s programs evolved to meet the social, recreational and economic needs of the day. In the mid-1990’s, DCA/Moorelands chose to focus exclusively on children and youth living in poverty. In 2001, the name was changed to Moorelands Community Services to better reflect the independent, multicultural, multi-faith and multi-ethnic community service it had become, while still honouring its inspired beginnings.
A New Chapter in History
In 2018, we rebranded as Moorelands Kids to reflect the compelling yet simple vision of our future – we believe Moorelands Kids is inspiring and it points to a clear direction of what we expect Moorelands to be doing in our second 100 years.
Empowering Kids to Transform Their Lives
Today we focus on empowering kids from low-income neighbourhoods through leadership development programs. We operate Moorelands Camp (established in 1917) in the Algonquin Highlands throughout the summer, in addition to providing year-round support through our after-school leadership programs (BLAST, LED and VITAL) and family programs (Baby Bundles and Christmas Sharing).