Our People

Patricia Streich, Chair of the SPCK&D, is a housing specialist and advocate on housing issues locally. She teaches courses on housing at the Queen's School of Urban & Regional Planning. Patricia has served on several local community boards over many years.

Leslie Benecki is a semi-retired healthcare executive. She has a Bachelor of Science (Purdue University), and an MBA and Master of Health Services Administration (University of Michigan) and is a Fellow with the American College of Healthcare Executives. She’s held progressive managerial roles at Alberta Health, a research centre at Queen’s University, St. Lawrence College, and two Community Health Centres. Leslie actively supports community development and social justice initiatives. She volunteers at Kingston Grand Theatre. Leslie enjoys reading, hiking, and attending sporting and cultural events with her family.

Alice Gazeley is a retired teacher who enjoyed students in P.E.I., N.S., PQ, and ON. Alice's family of nine children lived in a small farming village nestled closely to a fishing village in Miminegash, P.E.I. She graduated from St. Dunstan's University, P.E.I. and completed her Master's Degree at The Catholic University of America, Washington, D.C. During her childhood, she watched her parents live the golden rule, "Love thy neighbour as thyself". Teaching gave her an outlet to expand her understanding of their example, and since retiring she has been able to advocate for justice, with a special focus on affordable housing.

Holly is a born-and-raised Kingstonian who recently graduated from Queen's University with a Master of Urban and Regional Planning. Currently she works for Arcadis IBI Group, providing a range of planning services to both non-profit and private sector clients. She is passionate about affordable housing, community, and mental health. She brings her unique range of volunteer experience to the SPCK&D board, including four years devoted to raising service dog puppies with Kingston 4 Paws Service Dogs. Through both her professional and volunteer work, she strives to learn what can be done to make Kingston a more equitable city for all.

Director at Large & Social Media Coordinator

Megan Meldrum

Megan is a Junior Planner for the Region of Peel's Planning and Development Services working alongside lower-tier municipalities on a range of development applications. She's passionate about equity in planning processes and access to safe, affordable housing. She is also a Queen's School of Urban and Regional Planning graduate.

Mary is a retired teacher after many years with the ALRCSS Board and has always been a strong advocate for Social Justice. Since retirement she has been able to commit more fully to issues in our Community in this area. For about fifteen years she coordinated Spiritual services at one of Kingston Senior Citizens Homes on a weekly basis. She has been the principal organizer for the collecting and delivering food baskets. This involves 50 families referred from Salvation Army plus others in need (60). She has organized and worked to help Habitat for Humanity organization and their workers and recently received the 50 years of service pin from the Canadian Cancer Society.

An ACA (England & Wales) qualified finance professional, Jennifer has 11+ years of experience in the global hospitality real estate space working with an extensive network of advisors. Her responsibilities included hotel performance management, development tracking & reporting, and multi-million dollar transactional support for properties in key gateway cities such as London, Istanbul, and Sydney. Passionate about all things urban and ready to give back to society in a more impactful way, Jennifer relocated from Abu Dhabi, UAE to Kingston, Ontario to pursue her Masters degree in Planning at SURP, Queen's University. A keen traveller and culture aficionado, Jennifer enjoys art galleries, good conversations, and plans to take up skating soon.

Ellory is completing her second year in the Master of Urban and Regional Planning Program at Queen's University. She joins us from her hometown of Ottawa, where she has a diverse background in working with the community. She is passionate about age-friendly planning, mixed-use communities, sustainable transportation, and newcomer access to affordable housing.

Hilary is Senior Counsel at Warder Law Professional Corporation where she practices exclusively family law, wills and estates. Hilary also has the privilege of representing children in Family Court by virtue of her appointment as an agent for the Children’s Lawyer of Ontario. It is through her work on behalf of children that Hilary became interested in social justice issues including the availability of affordable housing in our community. Hilary has lived in and practiced law in Kingston most of her career and is actively involved in local legal associations and at Queen’s Law School. Hilary is also appointed as a Dispute Resolution Officer in Family Court and is currently working on her Master of Laws focusing on shared parenting arrangements in high conflict families.

Bio coming soon!

Alessandro is currently finishing up his MPA (master’s in public administration) at Queen’s University. He also did his undergraduate degree at Queen’s, thus working for the council as a research intern will allow him to further engage with the community that he has called home for the past five years. This summer his research focus was on analyzing service policies and coordination to meet needs and address gaps across communities with regards to housing, social, and health services. He's looking forward to meeting everyone and spending another summer here in Kingston where he will be enjoying some of my hobbies such as playing soccer, tennis and enjoying the outdoors.

Stephanie is completing a Master of Planning Degree within the School of Urban and Regional Planning (SURP) Program at Queen’s University. She has worked in the public sector in social statistics, research, and analysis and holds a Master of Arts Degree in Sociology from the University of Calgary. Stephanie’s planning interests include healthy communities, and her graduate research report focuses on the role of municipalities on food systems planning. Stephanie is involved in affordable housing developments across Ontario and school street Initiatives in Kingston.

Michelle Schwarz is a semi-retired Developmental Service Worker who enjoyed a 30+ year career as a Residential Counsellor at Ongwanada Hospital. She provided support for adults with dual diagnosis of a psychiatric delay coupled with a developmental delay of varying degrees. She has continued to assist in this role during a staffing crisis in the Developmental Services Sector.

The past several years, she has been involved in several initiatives to help address critical issues faced by the homeless/precariously housed. She lives a life style dedicated to being kind to the environment and happily educating others to do the same.

She and her husband enjoy visiting and spending time with their adult children, whom are both very in tune with today’s environment and culture.

Mary-Jo is passionate about family, faith, community, life-long learning, and pastoral care. For the past six years, she has been the Coordinator of Religious Education for the Archdiocese of Kingston. She represents the Archbishop on the Justice & Peace Commission and on multiple outreach programs. Concurrently, for the past 18 years, she has been actively involved in Prison Ministry both professionally as a Chaplain at Collins Bay Medium and Maximum Security Institution and as Chair of the Prison Volunteers’ Committee. Mary-Jo has a Master’s Degree in Divinity from Queen’s University, Kingston, a Master’s Degree in Education from Mount Saint Vincent University, Halifax, and a Bachelor’s Degree in Psychology from Saint Thomas University, Fredericton. Originally from Cape Breton, NS, she has lived across Canada and Europe and presently resides with her husband in Bath, ON, and close to their three children.