Mike Palmer

Mike Palmer is the Executive Director of the Foundation of Catholic Community Services, a non-profit organization that owns the building where Face à Face is currently located. When Centraide unexpectedly cut their funding a year ago, Face à Face was forced to look for a new locale. Of course, finding accommodation is often quite difficult for non-profit organizations. Mike, however, was exceptionally welcoming. He chose to help Face à Face because it “epitomizes the foundation’s mission.” That mission is simple: to support organizations with its infrastructure in helping to change people’s lives. The foundation has created a unique model with its infrastructure, a ‘shared space’, that rents out their offices to groups that are in need, rather than privileging those that can ‘afford’ the usual price tag that comes with a downtown location. This way, they have redefined what a building can be, and do. This is a rarity worth preserving: a business model that helps the non-profit. Truly, the foundation has cultivated a space for non-profit groups to come together in forming a collectivity that allows them to support one another. The building where Face à Face is located houses 25 organizations – a vibrant community formed of individuals and groups with different mandates that have all come together in supporting each other. When asked what Face à Face has brought to their community, Mike answers plainly, “Life.” Anyone that walks through the building’s doors immediately senses the dynamic community therein: “What was really missing was a service provider… and now we have service providers. There are people. There’s action. There’s drama. There is work being done in the community.” Mike urges the population to help Face a Face in facing their new financial struggles – struggles he, as a director of a non-profit organization, is all too familiar with. He recognizes that “helping people and changing people’s lives is a difficult job, and any group like that deserves all the support we can give them.” He is spot-on. Thank you, Mike, for your on-going support.

Written by Emma Telaro