Kelly Lalande
Posted September 17, 2014
Kelly was a self identified shy person when she joined ACORN in early 2005 during ACORN Canada’s third ever organizing drive in East York. But that shyness did not last too long. In the early spring of 2005 Kelly and 40 ACORN members from her public housing building on Lumsden Avenue in Toronto grew tired of getting the run-around from executives at Toronto Community Housing (TCH), and decided to take matters into their own hands. Their member dues paid for a few 12 seat vans to take them to the TCH board meeting in order to get their repair issues directly to the Board. And did they ever! They took over the board meeting, made their demands in spectacular fashion, and low and behold the TCH board made Kelly’s building their top priority for repairs.
More recently Kelly has taken a leadership role in the East York Chapter, and won the engagement award at Toronto ACORN’s reception for being the member with best attendance in the city. Her main campaign focus right now is our Digital Access campaign for $10 internet for low income families. She led an action at Rogers’ Headquarters, which won ACORN a meeting with their Executives, and then helped explain to Rogers what they could do to end the digital divide.
Click here to watch a video featuring Kelly talking about ACORN’s Digital Access campaign for $10 internet.