32 Facts About Cheri DiNovo

Cheri DiNovo served at the Emmanuel-Howard Park congregation in Toronto before entering politics and, since January 2018, is the minister for the Trinity-St Paul's Centre for Faith, Justice and the Arts.

Cheri DiNovo was first elected in a by-election on 14 September 2006 and retired from politics on 31 December 2017.

Cheri DiNovo grew up in a rooming house owned by her parents.

Cheri DiNovo's time spent at the Fred Victor Mission convinced her to earn her high school equivalency and enrol at Centennial College, though she soon transferred from Centennial to York University.

An openly bisexual woman, Cheri DiNovo was the only woman to sign Canada's first gay liberation manifesto "We Demand" in 1971.

Cheri DiNovo left university shy of her degree and began working for a corporate headhunting firm, then in the early 1980s ran her own firm - the Abbott Group, a recruitment firm that specialized in placing women in high-profile jobs - for five years.

Cheri DiNovo earned her masters of divinity in 1995 and served a rural charge in Brucefield, Ontario for two years before beginning her ministry at Emmanuel-Howard Park United.

Cheri DiNovo began hosting a weekly radio show, The Radical Reverend, on Toronto's CIUT-FM in 2000 which ran until 2006, before resuming in 2017.

Cheri DiNovo performed the first legal same-sex marriage registered in Canada in 2001.

Cheri DiNovo's book Querying Evangelism: Growing a Community from the Outside In won the Lambda Literary Award in the Spirituality category for 2006.

Cheri DiNovo pulled together more three-party agreement bills than anyone else.

Cheri DiNovo had the support of NDP stalwart Michael Lewis and many members of the riding's executive.

Cheri DiNovo defeated Liberal Sylvia Watson in the 14 September 2006 by-election to replace Gerard Kennedy in the Legislative Assembly of Ontario.

In October 2006, a Toronto Star column by Carol Goar said Cheri DiNovo had brought a new clarity and assertiveness to the NDP caucus' voice in the Ontario Legislative Assembly.

Since entering the Assembly, Cheri DiNovo has approached a variety of poverty-related issues, including raising minimum wage and welfare rates in the province, creating more affordable housing and ending the government's tax clawback of the federal child benefit supplement.

Cheri DiNovo retained her seat in the 2007 Ontario general election and began serving her term in the Ontario Legislature's 39th Parliament sessions.

Cheri DiNovo increased the margin of victory from the 2006 by-election.

When Howard Hampton announced he was stepping down as leader of the Ontario New Democratic Party in June 2008, Cheri DiNovo was one of four MPPs, along with Michael Prue, Peter Tabuns and Andrea Horwath, whose names were suggested by party insiders as potential candidates in the 2009 Ontario NDP leadership convention.

Cheri DiNovo became the Third Deputy Chair of the Committee of the Whole House, known as the "Deputy Speaker", on 26 March 2009.

Cheri DiNovo ran for re-election in the 2011 Ontario general election.

Indications from polling in the summer suggested that Pasternak might win; but on election day, Cheri DiNovo easily won re-election.

Cheri DiNovo defeated Liberal candidate Nancy Leblanc by 525 votes.

Cheri DiNovo avoided the Liberal success in Toronto that saw three out of four other NDP incumbents go down to defeat.

Cheri DiNovo has been an outspoken advocate for cyclist and cyclist safety, including her "one-meter rule", which the government finally passed as part of their larger transport bill in 2015.

Cheri DiNovo tabled Bill 137, Cy and Ruby's Act, 2015 which seeks to amend the Children's Law Reform Act and the Vital Statistics Act to be more LGBTQ inclusive so that LGBTQ parents are recognized as parents under the law.

Cheri DiNovo successfully proposed a bill to recognize Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder as a workplace injury for first responders fast-tracking their Workplace Safety and Insurance Board benefits.

Similarly, Cheri DiNovo tabled her bill on inclusionary zoning five times over eight years, passing second reading twice.

Cheri DiNovo openly supported a leadership review of Mulcair's stewardship of the federal party at the party's April 2016 convention and called for the NDP to reaffirm its socialist principles.

Cheri DiNovo announced that she will not be running for re-election to the Ontario legislature in the 2018 provincial election.

Cheri DiNovo announced on August 2,2016, that she was withdrawing from the race for health reasons after having recently suffered two small strokes.

Cheri DiNovo announced that she will not be standing for re-election in the 2018 provincial election and resigned her seat in the legislature at the end of 2017.

Cheri DiNovo became the minister of the Trinity-St Paul's Centre for Faith, Justice and the Arts effective January 1,2018 and continues to present the Radical Reverend program on CIUT radio.