Judith Forrestal is one of a handful who attended CHFT’s first meeting in the basement of Alexandra Park Co-op in 1974, so it’s fitting that she be named Honorary Lifetime Director in this, its 50th anniversary year.
Judith was a young journalism student at Ryerson (now Toronto Metropolitan University) living with other young progressives just across the Don Valley at the Bain Apartments. She’d become active the previous year in a campaign by the tenants to take advantage of a federal program to create housing co-ops and turn the then 60-year-old housing complex into a place where its tenants would become self-governing members and not be subject to the whims of landlords. They accomplished this goal, although not without a short time as part of the City of Toronto’s Cityhome portfolio.
With the formation of a sector organization, the Bain Residents’ Council thought Judith would be a good candidate to represent Bain as one of CHFT’s founding directors. She accepted the role! Judith recalls the excitement of signing the incorporation documents and then using a federal grant to hire Mark Goldblatt and Noreen Dunphy as the organization’s first staff.
Soon the demand for new co-ops and the supports needed for the existing ones exceeded the limits of two staff, and three more were hired. By 1976, CHFT conducted its first board training, a tradition that remains strong nearly half a century later. Co-op development was happening at what Judith describes as a “wicked” pace. “We debated: is there an optimal size to retain community, balancing the intimacy of small with the increased volunteer capacity of bigger?”
Judith is proud of one of the most significant developments at CHFT during this time: the land trust, where a separate corporation owns the land and buildings and leases them to a co-op in exchange, eventually, for monthly rents. This innovation endures at CHFT today and has also been adopted by many other organizations to ensure ongoing affordability and provide a revenue stream to the sector to build more housing. Co-ops owe a big vote of thanks to the board and other sector supporters who saw this potential and put the land trust system in place.
Judith left the Bain and four years later moved into the Church Isabella Residents’ Co-op where she has lived for 43 years .She was the co-op’s CHFT delegate for 15 years. Calling herself an “aging hippie,” Judith thanks the universe and all those who worked so hard for her thriving co-op community, her home in a little village in downtown Toronto. There, she chairs the Aging in Place Group. She was also instrumental in forming CHFT’s Aging in Place Committee in 2008. Judith’s volunteerism extends beyond the co-op sector: she has served on the Seniors’ Advisory Committee of the Mid-Toronto West Health Link and the board of directors of Care Watch, a home care advocacy group. She has been an active member of Amnesty International, and she is currently a volunteer at Romero House, a refugee settlement house.
Retired now, Judith had long careers in journalism and non-profit administration, following an MA in Public Administration from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, as well as her BA in Journalism. We’re thrilled to name Judith as CHFT’s 2024 Honorary Lifetime Director!
