For decades, Linda and Al Slavin have lived on a beautiful acreage of mature trees (most of which they planted), veggie plots, and warm communal energy on the outskirts of Peterborough. They are stalwart contributors to the city’s social and environmental fabric.
Linda’s life defies a tidy summary. She was a catalyst in countless organizations – local, provincial, national, and international – helping to start, grow, and shape them before moving on to the next challenge.
“I have Parkinson’s now, so I’m doing much less. I work with For Our Grandchildren, I work with the Kawartha Commons Cohousing group and I do some odd work beyond that,” Linda said. “But I was involved. I helped establish the Kawartha World Issues Centre (KWIC). I had the kind of career that just one thing led to another. Many things came quickly; working on anti-racism through KWIC, gender issues with Elizabeth Fry, the Social Planning Council, GreenUP and others.”
Whatever she took on, Linda’s approach was always rooted in collaboration and public education.
“We developed a popular education style where you introduce people to the idea and got their gut reaction. And then you worked on patterns that they saw. And then you gradually worked that into action. But if you didn’t go through those phases, the personal and the patterns, you wouldn’t get to the analysis to do the action.”
When federal funding was cut to the programs she ran, Linda shifted her focus to youth with special needs through the Community Opportunity and Innovation Network (COIN), turning it into a training hub that helped people with limited abilities find independence through employment.
Her reach was international, too. “I got a job with Trent University and I found some seed funding for four and a half million dollars and we spent over seven years in Ecuador, Mexico and Canada, mostly in Ecuador and Mexico,” she said.
Al added, “Linda basically was the manager then, but professors from Trent provided the scientific input to work with people in Ecuador and Mexico.” After returning to Peterborough, Linda remained deeply engaged. “You were Co-chair of Sustainable Peterborough for several years,” Al gently reminded her.
“So, I’ve done my bit,” Linda replied.
Her “bit” also included running for political office five times. Four times provincially and federally for the NDP and once for mayor. “It was difficult but essential. I think you have to keep the word out there,” she said.
“Her real role was to make sure people were aware of Social Democratic principles,” Al said. “She wanted to ensure those messages were always there front and centre when the elections came around.”
Despite her leadership, Linda sees herself as a student of community.
“The first thing I learned was that you don’t have all the answers. You have to listen to others,” she said.
That listening also included challenging colonial ideas. “It was very important to me to get rid of that word ‘development’ and call it something like equity, international equity work. Just to get out of the habit of thinking we do for people, we have to do with people, right?”
She credits her parents for her activist instincts.
“My dad sat on the school board and he sat on the local council in Havelock where we lived. And my mother was very involved in the church, both at the local level and at the regional level.”
To this day, people stop Linda on the street to thank her.
“We’re often downtown and somebody will come up to us, ‘Oh you’re Linda Slavin, I remember when you did this, this and this,’” Al said. “Heather Ray, Peterborough’s recent candidate for the federal NDP told them, ‘I remember being on the school bus and seeing the sign for Linda Slavin running for government. I thought, well, if she could do it, maybe I can someday too.’” Al’s path was more linear. A physicist, he taught at Trent University for 37 years, did some board work, judged science fairs, and was active in the anti-nuclear weapons movement in the 1970s and 1980s.
“That is a problem that hasn’t gone away,” he said. “Now climate change has sort of eclipsed nuclear weapons as the pending disaster… except the difference is, nuclear war might happen, it might not happen, whereas climate change is happening. That is why we are both on the board of the climate activist group, For Our Grandchildren.”
Linda agreed: “I’m really pleased to see [communities] still working at some of the issues that unfortunately we thought we dealt with but are coming back. You know, it’s the environment but it’s also human rights: racism and gender issues among others.”
For the Slavins, environmentalism isn’t a niche cause, it’s the defining fight of our time.
“We’re not going nearly fast enough, nor are we doing enough. We’re going to be in for some pretty tough times ahead but we’re still working, seeing what we can do,” Al said.
Their decision to start a fund at the Community Foundation was rooted in their values.
“I suspect we were making donations to a number of organizations locally. We probably said, OK, we can afford to give away this much money this year, why don’t we give it to the Community Foundation and they can grant some to these organizations we care about and have some for their own coffers,” Al recalled. “Sustainability was a big driver for sure.”
Over time, that act of giving grew into a platform for action. Their commitment to climate justice began to shape their involvement with the Community Foundation.
“If the Foundation has investments in fossil fuels and we think that’s a bad thing for the community, it’s up to us to pass on information,” Al said.
Linda added, “It was a pretty hard position to hold because I really like [former Foundation executive director] John Good and I really like [current E.D.] Jennifer DeBues and what they are doing with the Foundation. But we felt that it was important that they are leaders and they needed to show that community foundations are leading this change across Canada for the future of our communities.”
Their advocacy for fossil fuel divestment led them to communicate regularly with the Community Foundation about fossil fuel investments. “We didn’t want to invest until they divested,” Linda explained.
Jennifer DeBues is grateful for Linda & Alan’s advocacy and was delighted to contact them in December 2023 when the Foundation’s board took the decision to move the Foundation’s pooled assets to a fossil fuel free investment portfolio. “Over the years, Al has acted like our own clipping service providing a rich resource bank of articles and information about fossil fuels and divestment. Al’s nudging, and that of other donors, definitely bolstered our learning and our motivation to make this change,” she said.
Their concern for climate change isn’t abstract. Ahead of the last federal election, Al wrote a pamphlet challenging misperceptions about the issue. “When you looked at the opinion polls, people rank affordability as number one, right? And climate was down around number six,” he said.
“What this pamphlet is trying to point out is that climate is not just a weather issue. It’s driving up food prices. It’s driving up health costs. Canada, on a per capita basis, produces twice as much greenhouse gases as the Chinese do and people just don’t know that.”
The Slavins continue to speak up for causes they believe in, including affordable housing. Al cited groups like Habitat for Humanity PKR and PATH as doing “really, really good work,” though he expressed frustration with local resistance. “There’s a court case ongoing, which is totally unnecessary,” he said.
Their advice: get involved, and don’t give up.
“Don’t get discouraged. You just realize, for example, that climate change is a real issue. It’s scientifically proven and it’s going to hurt your community,” Linda said. “Because you know that, you work to build a viable future for others. You lead by example.”
Al added, “If you want to do what’s good for the community, it’s very good for the community to try to avoid climate change, to reduce fossil fuel use.”
For those unsure where to start, Linda offered this: “Do the little piece that you can do. It might be soliciting donations; it might be personal actions around the home. Do what you can do.”
Above all, they believe change starts with personal commitment.
“If nobody works on what they believe in, then things won’t improve,” Al said. “You have to find out what you’re passionate about and then find the best way to work on that.”
Their support of the Community Foundation fits squarely into that ethos. “It’s a good organization,” Al said. “The whole idea of having a Foundation that broadly supports social issues within the community is a really good idea.”