Archives: Grants (page 61)

The Northwestern Ontario Women's Centre, in partnership with the Thunder Bay and District Coordinating Committee to End Woman Abuse, will develop and pilot a high risk navigation model/response system protocol in Thunder Bay for women and children facing violent perpetrators. The partnership will also develop and deliver training for trusted intermediaries in gender based violence theory and practice, and in turn, they will provide training for legal system professionals through workshops and an annual professional training day. The project will increase collaboration between community-based advocates and the justice system to intervene in incidents with the most severe potential consequences.

The Ontario Federation of Indigenous Friendship Centres (OFIFC) will establish the Trusted Intermediary Education Project, a professional development training for the OFIFC's Community Justice Program (CJP) Coordinators who facilitate culture-based diversions for urban Indigenous communities throughout Ontario. The proposed project will provide CJP Coordinators with curriculum to train volunteers to support with the diversions process, best practices for program outreach, and training on developing effective memoranda of understanding. The program aims to establish more consistent levels of facilitation with increased effectiveness and improved outcomes for clients.

St. Stephen’s Community House will evaluate the effectiveness of community mediation and coaching, as practiced in the 12 services of the Ontario Community Mediation Coalition, in resolving immediate conflicts and especially in improving the ongoing capacity for communications and future conflict resolution in and among clients using these services. Partners include the Winkler Institute for Dispute Resolution. The program evaluation will benefit both service providers and clients in giving and receiving community mediation services.

University of Ottawa will examine how technology can be used to mitigate a barrier to the public effectively accessing justice: court form complexity. It will build on the academic researchers’ previous work evaluating the accessibility of paper-based court forms to examine the benefits and identify remaining challenges to making court forms easily accessible and usable for the public, with Community Legal Education Ontario's (CLEO) Guided Pathways used as an example. Partners include Western University and CLEO. This grant will benefit academics, service providers, as well as service users.

The International Human Rights Program (IHRP) will conduct research on the human rights implications of using predictive analytics and artificial intelligence (AI) in the criminal justice context, with primary focus on examining how predictive analytics is used to support community policing by police departments. Partners include Citizen Lab. This grant will benefit the general public as well as policy makers and legislators interested in the regulation of AI technologies. Through this work, IHRP aims to increase public awareness and understanding of the use of AI and predictive technology in the Canadian criminal justice system. IHRP also aims to promote discussions around appropriate oversight and accountability mechanisms for these technologies.

Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network will develop and implement a qualitative research protocol to evaluate, among people who use drugs and harm reduction service providers, both (1) their knowledge of and use of the Good Samaritan Drug Overdose Act and (2) the effectiveness of the public legal education resources proffered to date on this topic in Ontario. The objective of this project is to analyze and report on research findings, with a view to informing any ongoing legal barriers and public legal education gaps that prevent people who use drugs from calling emergency services during an overdose.

Community Advocacy & Legal Centre will carry out a literature review and qualitative study on models of justice-health partnerships (JHPs) in Canada, the United Kingdom, the United States, and Australia. It will create an evaluation framework to assess the impact of existing and newly emerging Justice & Health projects, looking specifically at: (1) the changes created for patients/clients; (2) the changes created for health care providers as trusted intermediaries; and (3) how these projects improve legal health and/or increase access to justice. The objective of this project is to support efforts to implement more effective JHPs for the benefit of patients and care providers as well.

King's University College will run a pilot project and related research study in Ontario that will address the needs of children and parents involved in "cross-over cases", high conflict separation or divorce family cases that also involve the child protection system due to allegations of neglect and abuse. Partners include the Office of the Children's Lawyer. The goal is to study the effectiveness of a program that will provide high conflict families with enhanced access to collaborative interdisciplinary responses (i.e. legal and child welfare) through an early targeted response initiative. The focus is on assisting families to receive timely, appropriate services to help them resolve parenting disputes in a child-focused, efficient way.

The Law Commission of Ontario (LCO) will conduct research and consultations to understand how automated decision-making systems are being used in the justice sector in Ontario and across Canada. This grant will benefit the public and justice sector stakeholders that are interested in the regulation of Artificial Intelligence (AI) technologies. The LCO aims to develop recommendations for a regulatory framework for algorithmic and AI technologies used by justice sector stakeholders. The LCO believes this work could influence successive access to justice research and policy‐making in the area of digital rights.

NORDIK Institute will develop a participatory action research project to help identify how particular social determinants act as barriers for Indigenous people involved in the justice system. The research will formulate and test interventions in the areas of housing, transportation, and/or mental health or addictions treatment and determine whether they result in less frequent breaches of bail or probation conditions, thus leading to fewer convictions and incarcerations. Project partners include the Indian Friendship Centre and John Howard Society within Sault Ste. Marie the Canadian Mental Health Association, as well as First Nations (Batchewana, Garden River, Thessalon, Missanabie Cree, Mississauga, Sagamok, Serpent River, and Michipicoten), police services (Anishinabek Police Services, the City of Sault Ste. Marie Police Services, and the Ontario Provincial Police), Crown and defense attorneys, and Legal Aid Ontario. This project seeks to improve the experience of Indigenous people with the justice system in Sault Ste. Marie and Algoma District.