The Dream Is Still Alive: Twenty-Five Years of Parkdale Community Legal Services and the Osgoode Hall Law School Intensive Program in Poverty Law

Over twenty-five years have passed since Parkdale Community Legal Services opened its doors in Toronto, changing the face of poverty law and clinical legal education in Ontario. This article details the formative years of the Parkdale clinic and its ongoing partnership with Osgoode Hall Law School. Despite initial opposition from the legal profession the clinic has survived, evolving into an innovative educational tool and delivery model of legal services. The clinic has become an essential component of the mixed Ontario legal aid system and a pattern for other clinics and clinical education programs in Canada. This article documents the considerations in locating the clinic in Parkdale; the opposition of the legal profession to the opening of the clinic; the removal of the prohibition on advertising by the Law Society of Upper Canada; and the early development of the poverty law clinical program at Parkdale