Cynthia Summers serves as the Commissioner of Housing Equity at Toronto Community Housing. Cynthia’s mandate is to support vulnerable and senior tenants living in TCHC who are in arrears of rent and facing eviction. To this end, Cynthia and her team have developed a ten step “OCHE Approach” to engaging vulnerable tenants. Furthermore she has previously served as an Adjudicator on the Ontario Landlord Tenant Board and thus has a deep understanding of issues related to housing.

With over twenty-five years in the broad social services sector and a Master’s degree in Social Work, Cynthia has extensive experience in understanding and supporting persons with vulnerabilities. At Humber College she teaches how to apply the use of ADR to engage vulnerable persons. Cynthia believes that it is necessary to develop a relational and pragmatic approach to working with vulnerable persons which recognizes the need for flexible and creative solutions to address issues related to housing at risk.