Goway Travel continued its relationship with Tourism Cares in 2017, recently sponsoring a team to spruce up community space in Toronto’s St James Town district.
Tourism Cares focused on city tourism in 2017 in keeping with the UN World Tourism Organization’s recognition of city tourism as a critical force in sustainable development and livability. This was the final Tourism Cares for Our Cities program, and the first in Canada, following programs in Oakland, Detroit, and Providence.
Located in the northeast corner of Toronto’s downtown, St James Town is the most densely populated neighbourhood in North America. Projects in the district included replanting and mulching raised beds around the community centre, building new picnic benches and cleaning up the area.
Teams also participated in three other projects: At Black Creek Community Farm, volunteers planted 50 blueberry and five service berry bushes and harvested 500 pounds of carrots. Not only did the group accomplish a lot, having volunteers all around North America on the farm raises awareness about food security and accessibility issues; A small, but mighty group raised awareness and paint brushes to help the StopGap Foundation spread their message while creating more accessible spaces throughout Toronto. Volunteers painted 14 ramps adorned with StopGap logos, and delivered a ramp to a local business to see their impact first-hand; Honouring fallen veterans of Canada by planting 250 trees with the Highway of Heroes Tribute. The highlight of the day was spending time with World War II and Korean War veterans at Sunnybrook Veterans Centre.
At the end of the day there were over 140 volunteers who travelled from all over North America, and more than $40,000 was donated in volunteer time and grant funding to social enterprises and organizations in Toronto.
In addition to membership with Tourism, Goway is a valued Partner with Children’s Wish Foundation, which includes sponsoring a wish child each year. It also fundraised in 2017 for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. The company also contributes regularly to the Wildlands Conversation Trust.
(https://www.goway.com/goway-travel/who-we-are/social-responsibility)