WoodGreen Community Services is helping to fill the gaps left by other agencies and food programs through its PSWs and senior staff members like Rochelle McAlister (left) and executive director Teresa Vasilopoulos, who regularly help package donations. (Dan Pearce/Torstar)
It was a Thursday afternoon in late March, and one of WoodGreen Community Service’s personal support workers (PSWs) was boarding a streetcar to go home when she received some appreciation.
“She got some accolades yelled toward her, for the care she gives to the vulnerable” said Frances Morton-Chang, WoodGreen’s director of assisted living and seniors. “They asked, ‘You’re in health care?’ She put her thumbs up. ‘Oh, we love you, we love you.’”
The worker — one of 140 who works under Morton-Chang at WoodGreen — waved at the driver behind the streetcar and boarded. It was a moment of increasing appreciation being shown to her and her colleagues, who have been doing the tough job of caring for some of the most vulnerable people in the city — made harder by the COVID-19 crisis.