Our team

Nick is the co-founder and CEO of Community Food Centres Canada, a national organization that builds and supports vibrant, food-focused community centres in low-income neighbourhoods. These centres are based on the idea that good food is a powerful force for greater health, equity and social change. Nick is a member of the Order of Canada, a recipient of the Jane Jacobs Prize, as well as the Queen’s Jubilee Medal and has an honorary doctorate from Ryerson University. Born in Tanzania and raised in Canada, he studied at University of Toronto and Warwick University in the UK as a Commonwealth Scholar. Nick's bestselling book, The Stop: How the Fight for Good Food Transformed a Community and Inspired a Movement, written with his wife, Andrea Curtis, was nominated for the Toronto Book Award and won several other awards.

Kathryn Scharf is the Chief Program Officer and co-founder of Community Food Centres Canada (CFCC).   Kathryn has worked for over 20 years in the community food security sector in Toronto from many vantage points: from grassroots work in with community kitchens and alternative food distribution through to program development and initiatives aimed at changing systems through food policy and action. Kathryn spent 6 years as Program Director at The Stop Community Food Centre, where she helped to develop the community food centre program model and the strategy to take the model to a national scale. In 2012, she helped to launch CFCC which has grown to a staff of more than 40 funding and supporting the capacity of 400 partner organizations across Canada.

Juniper Locilento has held roles in marketing, communications, fundraising and government relations with more than two dozen charities in health, human services, education, and arts & culture. 

Prior to joining Community Food Centres Canada in 2019, she was Senior Director, Development for the YMCA of Greater Toronto and a Senior Consultant for KCI (Ketchum Canada Inc.) where she provided counsel for six capital campaigns. 

Juniper is committed to advancing the profession of fundraising: she has completed Board service terms for the AFP Foundation for Philanthropy Canada,  AFP Greater Toronto Chapter and AFP Canada, where she served as Chair, Government Relations. She was the lead author for Asking Matters, the case for AFP’s role in public affairs, and a co-author of AFP’s Fundraising is Awesome, a primer on the fundraising profession. She has also appeared before the Senate Special Committee on the Charitable Sector to speak about the importance of professional fundraising and is a frequent conference presenter. 

Juniper holds a Master’s of Philanthropy and Nonprofit Leadership from Carleton University. She is an instructor in the Fundraising Management Program at Toronto Metropolitan University’s Chang School, and a member of Rogare’s Critical Fundraising Network and The Charity Report’s Literary Circle.