The following text may have been generated by Optical Character Recognition, with varying degrees of accuracy. Reader beware!

NEWSMAKERS Southlake United Way on front the lines in 09 More demand posed challenge BY CHRIS TRABER Torontobom Zanotti up a benevolent type Today the longtime Vaughan and United Way of York Region chief executive officer said hes doing what he was meant to do professionally and personally A 1993 University of Toronto masters in social work graduate the man at the helm of consecutive recordbreaking fundraising cam paigns has successfully combined creativity passion and action across a number of senior positions in the charitable sector After years of service at the Rex- dale Community Health Centre Mr joined York Regions community services and hous ing department where he was a catalyst for YorkLink All Our Kids the Early Years Pilot and the Regions first task force He then joined United Way of York Region in a time of change and growth leading the allocation portfolio before moving to director of campaign where he worked with stakeholders to transform the tra ditional campaign to an innovative business model He brought the same change agenda to a number of other orga nizations as head of Family Day Care Services founding president and chief executive officer of Villa Charities Foundation and most recently ptesident of Safe Commu nities Foundation Canada In 2007 he returned to United Way of York Region as the organi zations pragmatic and personable leader Service to others is his mantra Im driven to help make things a little better he said United Way is a good fit We bring people com munities corporations and dollars together to fulfill need He recounts a pair of crowning moments in 2009 The first was hitting our cam paign goal in January Ours was one of a few United Ways across Canada to meet aggressive targets We did that on the generosity of York Region donors It was DANIELE resident was named chief executive officer of United Way of York Region in 2007 humbling to see all these people pull together Another highlight for Mr ti was the information gathering process for his agencys milestone report Addressing Our Strengths Oi4r agencies are hearing more knocks on their doors Supporting them is the challenge The town hall meetings and discussions across the- region were amazing I thought wed only hear stories of need but we also discovered strength and hope It changed my perspective on how we have to shape things in the future It seems to be working With only weeks left in this years crusade residents employ ees and businesses have helped push the United Way to 85 per cent of its 765million goal The year ahead promises chal lenges and opportunities he said Our agencies arc hearing more knocks on their doors Supporting them is the challenge Building quality of life across the region meeting the needs and addressing our strengths are the opportuni ties We want to do positive work in our communities positive sus tainable things that get us away from crisis management The family man with the abil ity to meld humility humour and business savvy to rally donors and volunteers is optimistic For all our wealth and health across York Region we really are caring and generous We have so much more capacity when were working together To donate to the United Way in support of its 39 social service agencies and the 100 programs they deliver call 905 474 9974 ext 242 or visit Longawaited cancer centre opens at Southlake BY TERESA tlatchfordyrmgcom The construction and creation of the stateoftheart regional can cer centre at Southlake has been quite a journey hospital president and CEO Dan Carriere says Originally the 105000-square- foot facility was to treat its first patients late last year but a con struction delay pushed the date back to March However the antic ipation of the centres opening is bittersweet Mr Carriere said as the need for the centre means there are more people being diagnosed I hope people dont know the importance of the cancer centre because if they do it means they have been diagnosed or affected he said But the cause has really brought the community together We will be one of the first cancer centres to open its doors with this type of advanced technology The Foundation set out to raise million for the can cer centre and through numerous individual group and corporate donations including a few cheques for 1 million in it has raised more than million When combined with regional funding we have met our goal Mr Carriere said The generos ity was astounding no matter how large or small the donation was The hospital is still awaiting con firmation on funding from the prov ince for the regional cancer program but Mr Carriere is confident a previ ous promise will be honoured and the centre will be able to open all three radiation suites to treat breast colorectal prostate and lung can cer and some types of lymphoma locally It would be a very dramatic issue DAN CARRIERE Southlake CEO overseeing the opening of the hos pitals new regional cancer centre if we couldnt open all three he said The clinicians would have to make a decision of who we treated here and who we sent to another location to treat The regional cancer centre is designed to make treatment easier on local patients eliminating the need to travel to the city or farther for care Mr Carriere is excited to be able to offer a high level of service right off the bat Having technol ogy such as image guided radio therapy and radiation treatment which targets only the cancer cells to minimize damage to the sur rounding healthy cells is what will make the centre unique We will be one of the first can cer centres to open its doors with this type of advanced technology he said The hospital has had a num ber of great moments in the past decade including its expansion creation of the cardiac centre as well as the thoracic centre but the regional cancer centre is the most important building block since its opening will affect so many people Mr Carriere said