By Kara Peters Unrau
Published June 2025
On April 5th, we celebrated the 36th Mayors’ Dinner in Marshall Hall at Bingemans. With over 860 guests, the room was at full capacity. It was bubbling with energy, especially as people spent the first hour mingling and talking to friends and neighbours. It is always heartening to see so many longtime supporters of The Mayors’ Dinner commit to participating in this community building fundraising event each year.
This year our theme was Knowing our Neighbours. We gathered to celebrate the many ways people share themselves with our community, and to hear about building community and celebrating diversity and inclusion. We heard inspiring stories from Fauzia Mazhar and John Lougheed. We also updated the community on the construction progress and highlighted The Working Centre’s Making Home project at 97 Victoria. Neil Aitchison and Mike Farwell entertained us with their MC skills, adding humour and insight throughout the evening.
The hosts Mayors Berry Vrbanovic, Dorothy McCabe, and Jan Liggett offered greetings on the theme of Knowing our Neighbours and thoughts on how cities are responding to the issues of our times.
The night’s reflections combined to deepen our understanding about the richness of diversity and the importance of being intentional neighbours. The Mayors’ Dinner was a perfect medium to celebrate this as the room was full of good will and friendly encounters as we gathered together for this evening.
Knowing Our Neighbours is a theme that resonates at the core of The Working Centre. Proceeds from the event contribute to our work that supports some of our most isolated neighbours, helping us to host a wide range of spaces where we build belonging and ways to access supports and resources. The evening celebrated the work we do that creates a web of services that brings care and respect to members of our community who need it most.
In this issue we have reprinted the reflections on Knowing Our Neighbours that were offered by our special guests for the evening, Fauzia Mazhar – The Meaningful Connections of Community and John Lougheed – Spiritual Care in Small Things.
Nancy Vernon Kelly welcomed us with a land acknowledgement, a blessing, and an appeal for us all to “harden not our hearts” in times of complexity.
Afterward, Nancy reflected on the evening in this way: “The energy, the solidarity, the heart of the banquet was a wonderful gift locally, in itself […] and also a gracious and merciful antidote, a grounding in what it means to be neighbours in a broader sense. It renewed my hope!”
The evening ended with an exciting announcement. We started with a new video on the Making Home project produced by Adam Rochon. The video can be found on the Working Centre website at www.theworkingcentre.org/making-home-video/.
Carol Taylor also welcomed speakers to the stage as she announced that the Making Home Capital Campaign reached its goal of $22 million raised to create 44 units of housing, a new home for St. John’s Kitchen, and a main floor medical clinic at 97 Victoria Ave N. See more on page 8 of this issue of Good Work News.
Music was provided throughout the evening by Andy Macpherson and the New Vibes Jazz Quintet. We are grateful to RBJ Schlegel Family Foundation for generously contributing as our main event sponsor.
This year’s Mayors’ Dinner theme of Knowing Our Neighbours directly faced the challenges of increasing isolation and dislocation with messages and examples of how people remain committed to shaping our communities and welcoming our neighbours with hope for a better world.
