Members of the Port Medway Fire Department Auxiliary: Vincent Dieras, Deb Noble, Deb Lemon, Barbara Parnell, Sandi Simpson and Darlene Norman. (Rick Conrad)

As people around Queens County woke up Monday morning to power outages, volunteers at the Port Medway Fire Hall were busy giving people a place to warm up and get something to eat.

The Port Medway Fire Department Auxiliary opened the hall to everyone who needed it. They started preparing food at 6:30 Monday morning and still hadn’t stopped Wednesday afternoon.

“Port Medway is a very special community and for years it has always looked after itself,” says Darlene Norman, president of the auxiliary.

“Whenever there is an emergency or a power outage, this hall immediately becomes open and there’s always prepared home-cooked meals.”

“It’s open 24 hours a day until the power comes back on,” says auxiliary member Deb Lemon, “so even in the middle of the night you can come and recharge and warm up.”

Norman and Lemon are part of a team of about a dozen volunteers who have served three meals a day since early Monday, feeding up to 35 people at a time.

“We do scrambled eggs, pancakes, bacon,” Norman says.

“One day for lunch, we had pizzas, one day we did sandwiches up. We did the best spaghetti and meatballs that people said they ever had. We had homemade cheese biscuits, homemade chicken soup.”

The fire hall has a diesel-powered generator so that it can open to anyone after storms, hurricanes and power outages. A Nova Scotia Power crew even stopped in on Wednesday for lunch.

It’s a place for people to find comfort as well as community.

“Anyone without power,” Norman says. “Mill Village people were here, there were people from over in West Berlin, East Berlin, … everyone knows, when it’s open, it’s open.

“This is a real community. It’s small, everyone’s compacted because of the way this community is designed, people know each other. It’s social, people come play cards. And whether or not you’re a member of the auxiliary it really doesn’t have a bearing on if you come in and help in this kitchen.”

MIke Vandale, left, and three friends play cards on Wednesday at the Port Medway Fire Hall. (Rick Conrad)

Mike Vandale, who lives in East Port Medway, was still without power Wednesday morning, so he was at the hall for some breakfast and a game of cribbage with three friends.

“It’s been fantastic. The auxiliary have performed above and beyond all expectations. Fantastic.

“Camaraderie, food, warmth, friendship. It’s a great place to come and see everybody and catch up on the news.”

Vandale adds, laughing: “Misery loves company.”

Norman says there are a lot of younger retirees in the small fishing village who have the time and energy to pitch in when needed.

Even when they’re not offering free meals during power outages, the hall welcomes the community for a free lunch every Wednesday. That’s in addition to their regular dances, bingo nights and other events.

People show their appreciation for the free meals by leaving generous donations. And Norman and Lemon say management at the Sobeys in Liverpool has also been supportive, giving the group a $50 gift card so they could stock up on groceries this week.

“That’s the community rubbing off on everybody else around us,” Lemon says.

Most of Port Medway had been reconnected as of Wednesday afternoon. A Nova Scotia Power spokeswoman told QCCR that crews were working to restore power to more than 200 customers in Queens County as of 3:30 p.m. Wednesday.

The Port Medway Fire Hall isn’t an official comfort centre. And it wasn’t the only place in Queens County offering help during the outage. Eight other locations were offering various services. You can check out the list on the Region of Queens website here.

Email: rickconradqccr@gmail.com

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Region of Queens Coun. Stewart Jenkins, Queens MLA Kim Masland and Greenfield and District Fire Chief Moyal Conrad at a funding announcement Monday about improvements at the fire hall. (Rick Conrad)

The Greenfield and District Fire Department will get much-needed improvements to its fire hall, with $600,000 in provincial funding announced Monday by Queens MLA and Emergency Management Minister Kim Masland.

“This funding will help ensure that the people who protect this area have the space and the infrastructure that they need,” Masland said at an event at the hall.

The support was part of almost $800,000 Masland announced for projects in Queens County at the Greenfield fire hall.

The Greenfield department is planning a $1.1- to $1.3-million renovation and expansion to its fire hall and emergency bays.

The work will ensure that the bays are the correct size for modern fire trucks. It will also create a dedicated bay for its rescue truck. Now, firefighters have to spend extra time driving a fire truck out of the bay to access the rescue truck.

The whole building is also getting a facelift, with new steel siding and other exterior improvements.

Renovations to the fire hall will make it even more useful as a community hall and a registered comfort centre.

Along with additional, expanded and accessible washrooms and separate shower rooms, the kitchen is getting a major facelift. At the fire hall’s popular fundraising breakfasts, volunteers can serve up to 300 people. With a new commercial kitchen, they will be able to serve more than 100 people an hour.

Chief Moyal Conrad told QCCR it will be the first time in 35 years that the fire hall has had significant work done.

“This will mean for us as a fire department it’s going to make my firemen safer, be able to respond faster and hopefully put a little more pride into their community with a new structure and all this gear potentially we could get out of this grant.”

The provincial contribution is on top of $200,000 from the Region of Queens Municipality and about $125,000 from the fire department’s own fundraising efforts.

Conrad said the department will raise the rest of the money.

Stewart Jenkins, a local business owner and municipal councillor for the area, is acting as the project manager for the hall overhaul.

He said the work will begin in a couple of weeks and be mostly finished by Christmas and likely wrapped up by April.

Jenkins said the work is vital to ensure the fire hall can continue to support the community. 

“It’s an important factor that we get the trucks out of the bays faster and especially the specific trucks that need to go can go immediately. And as far as the hall imporvements, it’s to become a centre for people if they need it. If there are power outages or whatnot, they can stay close to home and still get fed and showered and taken care of.”

Masland also announced $187,143.35 in funding from the province on Monday for groups maintaining trails in Queens.

The Queens Rails to Trails Association will get $144,345 for work on the Hunts Point Trail, including brushing, ditching, resurfacing and culvert replacement. The group will also get a total of $25,034 in an annual maintenance grant to look after various trails in Queens.

The Queens County ATV Association is receiving $17,763.75 for development of the new Deep Brook Trail, which will stretch from Highway 8 to River Road in Milton. 

Email: rickconradqccr@gmail.com

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Kristopher Snarby, president of the Seaside Centre in Beach Meadows, says volunteers and the community have helped revitalize the community centre. (Rick Conrad)

Volunteers in the Beach Meadows area have revitalized their local community centre, bringing it back from the brink just two and a half years ago.

When a new board of directors took over the Seaside Centre in Beach Meadows in November 2021, many in the community feared it would close.

But in the time since, the centre has reclaimed its integral place in the community. 

Kristopher Snarby is president of the Seaside Centre. He was one of those new board members. 

“We came into a situation where people were tired and they just couldn’t keep going with the way things were. And we had a group of energetic people step in. The community made it clear they wanted to keep the building. We had a huge turnout at that meeting. It was evident from that that people wanted to make sure that we kept this facility in the community.”

Over the past couple of years, board members and other volunteers have raised thousands of dollars to renovate the centre. It’s now holding more regular community events and even has a couple of regular tenants renting space to help pay the bills.

They have installed new insulation and heat pumps throughout the facility to make it more energy efficient. And they plan this year to install a new metal roof and metal siding to help it withstand the harsher weather conditions on the coast.

They also invested $80,000 in a new generator to make the building a comfort centre during periods like hurricanes or power outages.

“These projects are huge capital projects that in theory should take a long time to achieve and we’ve done a lot in the short term. … That’s almost $300,000 in capital improvements to the centre in two or three years. So it’s been busy and we’re investing in the centre to ensure it keeps on going for a long time and it’s really positive.”

The centre held its annual general meeting this week, where the board highlighted some of the successes of the past year. The facility recorded a $28,842 surplus last year.

Snarby says the Seaside Centre wouldn’t have been able to do it without its group of about 100 volunteers and the community’s support. More than half of its revenue comes from fundraising and individual donations.

“We’ve had huge amounts of support both in terms of volunteer hours but also donations. We’ve gotten donations anywhere from $20 to $1,000 or $5,000. So we’ve had big donations, small donations. It all goes into the pot to make that happen. Without that, none of this would have been achievable. All of our grants have required 20 to 25 per cent contribution from the community. Every event we’ve had people are super generous with donations and coming out to support the centre.”

“The community support it’s allowing to push through and really get this done.”

He said after the work on the exterior of the building this year, the next long-term project may be to update their kitchen facilities. 

“And then also just continuing to put on events and to be a place where people can come and gather. We have weekly groups that get together for yoga, for crafting, quilting. We’d like to expand that into some other weekly groups that attend here and just have more events for the community.”

Snarby says they’re always looking for more volunteers or for people to put on more events at the centre. You can find more information at their website at seasidecentre.ca or by joining their Facebook group.

Email: rickconradqccr@gmail.com

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