Moving Forward Through Partnerships

OUR HISTORY
Distress Centres across Ontario are community based organizations who receive the majority of funding from the communities they serve.  Over 2,300 volunteers staff these Centres’ primary service, a free, anonymous and confidential telephone service providing emotional support, crisis intervention, suicide prevention and linkages to emergency help when necessary.

1967
Gordon Winch, along with Jim Fisk, Bill Kilbourne, and several others, started the first Distress Centre in Toronto.  Gordon Winch, working as a minister in area pubs, recognized how desperate people were for caring listening, and how healing that was.  Based on the model of listening started by Britain’s Samaritans organization in 1953, the ‘befriending’ style of volunteer telephone services takes hold throughout the province.

1971
Ontario Association of Telephone Distress Centres is formed by five Ontario Distress Centres.  They came together to share information and discuss ways to enhance their services. 

1972
The Ontario Association of Distress Centres began the tradition of holding annual training conferences for staff and volunteers of Member Centres.  Over the years these conferences have been held at various locations throughout the province.

1980
The fifteen members of the Association understood the value of best practices.  An Accreditation Standards program was developed in the areas of administration, training, ethics, service delivery and community integration.  The program was revised over the 90’s and was funded by a grant from the Ontario Trillium Foundation.

1982
The Ministry of Health and Long Term Care recognizes the importance of Distress Centres and DCO by providing the Association with operational funding.  The following year, the Association is incorporated as a charitable organization.

1992
The organization starts to be known as Distress Centres Ontario or DCO but continues to keep its original name for legal purposes.  The membership of the organization includes twenty-one member centres throughout the province.

1997
The Association has a membership of 25 community based Distress Centres throughout Ontario.  These centres logged over 110,000 volunteer hours engaged with callers while answering over 250,000 calls in that year alone.  The DCO Management Information Systems Programs continues to capture caller trends and changes, providing a basis for applied research.

2003
September 10.  First Annual World Suicide Prevention Day held, jointly organized by the World Health Organization and the International Association for Suicide Prevention (IASP).  This day focuses attention on the problem of suicide and is a call to action across the world.  Many Distress Centres use this commemorative day to raise community awareness throughout the province.

2004
Distress Centres Ontario’s membership reviews its organizational structure and develops a long term Strategic Plan (to 2008) and revises it’s Mission, Vision and Values statements.

2006
The inaugural sessions of THE PARTNERSHIP TOOLKIT series of Educational Forums in held in Niagara Falls.  This semi-annual gathering of member centres and partner groups and agencies provides an excellent forum for networking and educating staff, volunteers and community members about issues related to mental health, volunteers and telephone support services.  Subsequent sessions have been held through out the province including sessions in London and Markham.

2006
The first issue of the electronic newsletter DCO eNews + Views hits the electronic airwaves.  Currently being distributed monthly, the newsletter includes profiles of the services of member centres, information of interest to members, partners and volunteers and notices of upcoming events.

2007

www.dcontario.org the website of the association receives a face-lift. A modern format continues to provide information to the community at large about the valuable and valued services of its member organizations while providing information on where to GET HELP.