[URBAN NOTE] "Goodwill to return to Toronto"

[rfmcdonald]

The Toronto Star's Holly Honderich notes the return of the Goodwill chain to Toronto, though perhaps too late for many of the workers formerly employed there.

Just five months after Goodwill Industries of Toronto, Eastern, Central and Northern Ontario filed for bankruptcy, shutting down 28 facilities, Goodwill Ontario Great Lakes has announced its plan to bring the thrift-shop social enterprise back to the city.

After receiving approval from Goodwill International, Goodwill Ontario Great Lakes CEO Michelle Quintyn told the Star plans have been initiated to bring back 600 jobs to the Toronto area through various Goodwill establishments.

The expansion will be a “fresh start” for Goodwill, Quintyn told the Star, and will not involve any of the infrastructure or management structure of the former operation in Toronto.

But this announcement won’t bring relief to the more than 400 employees who were thrown out of work in January, many of whom were owed thousands of dollars by the bankrupt chapter, according to Goodwill’s bankruptcy documents.

“It was traumatic,” Moe Rutherford, former union business representative for Goodwill TECNO, said of the closure.

Rutherford, who said he maintains contact with many of the former Goodwill employees, estimated that 80 percent of them are still out of work.