Robert left a long-career as a hotelier to pursue a passion for design.  He earned a Diploma from the International Academy of Design and Technology and then in 2008, decided to contribute his design talents to benefit those living in social housing and on a limited income. Robert volunteered his services to tenants at Ecuhome Corporation (a Toronto subsidized supportive housing provider) and found tremendous reward in helping people create a space that they felt proud of and were happy to call home.   Robert also became the Community Champion for GLOBE (Green Light on a Better Environment); a program that focuses on changing the energy conservation behaviours of social housing tenants. By pairing these two programs together for almost two years, he reported improvements in both the quality of life for tenants, as well as measurable reductions in overall energy consumption and significant financial savings for a major subsidized supportive housing provider. This opened the door to yet another passion for Robert - promoting positive social change and creating healthy environments.So, in the spring of 2010 Robert became the Community Project Coordinator for The SUCCEED Project - a community based research photo voice project that compared neighbourhood environmental health inequities in the city of Toronto,  in order to identify and promote health supporting policies for the city. This was life changing for Robert and he developed an immediate commitment to the work. Today Robert is  Communications and Knowledge Translation Coordinator at The Centre for Environmental Health Equity, and continues to create healthy environments as an Interior Designer at the Centre for Social Innovation in downtown Toronto.

Why I do what I do:

Live positively. Promote positive social change. To help people live a better life. Support environmental health equity