SISO chair Hussein Hamdani speaks at rally in support of New Dawn Centre.

A week after someone distributed a “poisonous” flyer to homes around the city's immigrant reception centre, about 300 people came out to show their support.

“It is a great feeling to know there are people who will support you, who will pray for you, who will do what they can on a cold Saturday afternoon to come to a gathering to say, ‘You are welcome,’ ” said Hussein Hamdani, chair of the Settlement and Immigration Services Organization board.

The weekend of Jan. 27, an anonymous flyer was delivered to homes around the New Dawn Centre, located on Rosedene Avenue along the Mountain brow. The unsigned, photocopied piece of paper warned of the potential for loitering, increased crime and reduced property values.

New Dawn, which opened last year, gives immigrants a place to stay, for two weeks on average, while they get up to speed on their new home.

Judy Matthews, an area resident who also volunteers at SISO’s downtown office, called the flyer she received at her home “quite poisonous.”

“It’s sort of insidious to me," she said. “It's planting the seed of hatred. It's not saying outright that this is a horrible place or an awful thing or that it's going to be an awful thing, it’s just planting a seed and that’s worse to me."

She said she talked about the flyer with other residents in her neighbourhood to make sure they knew about the centre and about the life of immigrants coming to Canada.

“We know this flyer was a one-off incident,” said Hamdani, himself a victim of a anonymous racist threat left on a SISO vehicle at the agency’s downtown office in November.

“It’s not representative of Hamiltonians and it is not representative of this neighbourhood. But gatherings like this prove and show evidence that we will not tolerate hatred and bigotry in our community.”