Our Executive Director

Michele Leering

Michele is the Executive Director and also provides services to clients (her specialties have been workers' compensation, social assistance and more recently criminal injuries compensation). She also does community development and law reform work. In the past, she chaired the Belleville Task Force on Hunger and was involved in several anti-poverty organizing initiatives. More recently, she was a founding member of the Affordable Housing Action Network (AHAN). She has been the author/editor of several publications including Surviving the Nineties: The Guide to Living In a Low Income in Hastings and Prince Edward Counties, Beyond Band-aids: A Community Response to Homelessness, and Community Legal Needs Assessment: Examining the Need for Access to Justice for Low-Income Residents of Lennox & Addington County. In 2009 she was awarded a Community Leadership and Justice Fellowship from the Law Foundation of Ontario and sojourned at Osgoode Hall Law School at York University.  She has been employed by the clinic for more than 20 years.  She received both her law and political science degrees from the University of Western Ontario. She was called to the Bar in 1985.

Our Lawyers

Gina Cockburn

Called to the bar in 1990, Gina worked in private practice, primarily in family law, including work for the Children's Lawyer, until 2001 when she joined the clinic staff.  Her focus in clinic work is housing and social assistance.  She is the supervising lawyer of our housing team.  Gina is Chair of the Affordable Housing Action Network and a past chair of the Three Oaks Foundation Board of Directors.

Deirdre McDade

Deirdre obtained both her honours degree in Political science and her law degree from Queens University. Called to the bar in 1995, Deirdre was in private practice doing litigation until she joined the clinic in September 1999.  Her work at the clinic focuses on social assistance cases, human rights and Criminal Injuries Compensation Board appeals.  She is active in the movement to end violence against women.  She is a past Board member of the Sexual Assault Crisis Centre in Kingston (1987-1996), a past Board member of 3 Oaks Shelter for Abused Women (1996-2000), a former volunteer coordinator at the SACQD (1991-1993), and a former member of the Quinte Coordinating Committee against Violence (2001-2005) and the Dedicated Domestic Violence Court (2003-2004). She is currently a board member of the Income Security Advocacy Centre.

Samantha Hayward

Samantha was called to the bar in 2008.  She graduated from York University with an undergraduate degree in Psychology in 2003 and obtained her law degree from Queen's University in 2007.  Samantha previously worked as a summer student in our clinic in 2006-2007.  Her current work at the clinic focuses on the area of housing and ODSP appeals.  Prior to joining the clinic in 2009, Samantha worked in private practice, mainly in the area of family law.

Daniel McCabe

Daniel graduated from Osgoode Hall Law School in 2010.  He also holds a history degree from the University of Toronto.  While in law school, Daniel spent a term as a caseworker in the Landlord & Tenant Division of Parkdale Community Legal Services.  After completing his studies, he articled at Lake Country Community Legal Clinic in Bracebridge.  Daniel joined the staff at CALC following his call to the bar in 2011.

Jordana Laporte

Jordana joined the clinic in August 2011.  She completed both her Common Law (2009) and Civil Law (2010) degrees at the University of Ottawa.  She also holds a Bachelor of Science from the University of British Columbia.  During law school, Jordana participated in the Philip C. Jessup International Law Moot Court Competition.  She completed her articles at the Federal Court in Ottawa and was called to the bar in 2011.