Jean Robinson has been chosen as Queens County’s volunteer of the year for 2025. (Rick Conrad)

Part of Jean Robinson’s job more than 30 years ago was to choose Queens County’s volunteer of the year.

Now, the Brooklyn resident and consultant has received the award herself.

“I was really surprised and honoured to be selected and I’ve been thinking it’s kind of funny because I came here in the late ’80s as the recreation director for the county and part of my job was helping select the representative volunteers, so it’s a bit of full circle.”

The Region of Queens Municipality announced earlier this summer that it had chosen Robinson as its volunteer of the year for her “remarkable and diverse volunteer resume”.

She has a full-time job as president of Horizons Community Development Associates, Inc., but that hasn’t stopped her from giving much of her free time to non-profits and other groups in the community.

Originally from Beersville, N.B., near Moncton, Robinson moved to the area in 1988 and has made her mark with many organizations, whether that’s volunteering at her kids’ schools when they were younger to the Queens County Girls Choir and Queens County Seafest to her current volunteer gig as chair of the Liverpool International Theatre Festival.

She’s also helped shepherd local community theatre productions at the Astor Theatre and with the Winds of Change Dramatic Society as a producer.

She credits her parents with teaching her the importance of volunteering at a young age.

“I just think that arts and culture have a really important foundational role in community and in a healthy community, so this is my way of being part of that and it ties to my bigger value that volunteering is foundational to communities, to community development and having a healthy place to live, work and play.”

She’s been involved with the theatre festival since 2011 and it was that connection that also garnered her the prestigious King Charles III Coronation Medal in January for services to the arts.

Former Lt.-Gov. Arthur LeBlanc and his wife Patsy are big fans of the festival and he nominated Robinson for the honour.

“And that came as a complete surprise. I opened my email one day back in early January and I thought is this a real email?” she says, laughing.

“It was very special. It was a lovely ceremony. I was able to take two of my three adult children. … It was lovely to see the breadth of volunteers that were being recognized for their work, whether it was in civil society or in government or in Indigenous relations.”

She says volunteering is changing as people’s family lives and priorities shift. Many groups, especially in rural communities like Liverpool, find it challenging to recruit and retain volunteers.

“I think it is still a struggle and I think that the days of folks volunteering for many years with an organization is maybe more of the exception than the rule than it used to be and just the ongoing long-term volunteer is a little more difficult to get now.”

Robinson is bucking that trend by staying with organizations like the theatre festival for the long haul. She says volunteering has helped her form and strengthen long-lasting friendships.

“People volunteer for different reasons and so, understanding that people may want to volunteer for social connections, they may want to do it for building skills which could then even potentially help on a resume.”

She says volunteer-run groups have had to adapt to remove any barriers to bringing new people on board.

“Knowing that there aren’t financial barriers for them to being involved and understanding that as an organization. Thinking about the strengths that volunteering brings to a person in the community but also how can we break down the barriers and support people to be part of the community. How do we open the door and make them feel welcome?”

Robinson will be the Region of Queens delegate to the provincial volunteer awards ceremony on Sept. 29. She’ll be one of 70 from around the province to be honoured with the award.

The Queens volunteer of the year is chosen from nominees for the region’s Ripple Effect volunteer recognition program which allows the public to nominate fellow community members for their volunteer efforts. More information about the Ripple Effect is available here on the Region of Queens website.

Email: rickconradqccr@gmail.com

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Region of Queens Council. Photo Region of Queens

The creation of a new police oversight board and rezoning for affordable housing topped the items at the recent Region of Queens Council meeting.

Council was on the road this Tuesday, June 27 at the Greenfield Fire Hall with a relatively light agenda.

Three recommendations came forward.

The first was a $5260 grant to the Privateer Days Commission from the Community Investment Fund. The money will help the Commission offset the $42,080 operational costs for this year’s event.

Next council put forth three names to be considered for the Provincial Volunteer Awards. Each year the Region selects two people for recognition.

In recent years the Region would select names from the Ripple Effect program, a municipal program for the public to recognize the volunteer efforts of others. Despite many requests, no nominations were received this year, so council had to submit names.

Beach Meadows resident Amy MacGowan will receive the award for her work to independently raise money for several community organizations. Notably, in the past year she has raised $35,000. Of that, $27,000 went to assist two local families dealing with cancer diagnoses and another $6,000 was raised to assist those impacted by the recent wildfires in Shelburne County.

The second recipient is Sylvia Hurley from Liverpool. Hurley is active in numerous groups throughout Liverpool including the Victorian Order of Nurses, the K-ettes, Ladies Auxiliary Milton Baptist Church, Hank Snow Tribute, and the Queens County PC Association.

Both women will be recognized at a provincial ceremony planned for September 25.

The final recommendation was to rezone a parcel of land in Liverpool from Lower Density Residential to Multiple Unit Residential. The rezoning is needed to allow the construction of the two proposed buildings along Lawrence Street.

In November 2022, Council sold four parcels of land for a dollar to the Queens Neighbourhood Cooperative Housing Ltd to build 26 units of affordable housing.

The Planning Advisory Committee approved the rezoning at their June 19 meeting.

Now that council has given their blessing, residents will have their say at a public meeting ahead of the August 8 Region of Queens Council meeting. Provided there are no objections, the rezoning will go into effect Aug 31.

Three items were up for discussion.

The first was a Council Implementation report from staff to indicate how several council initiatives are proceeding.

The second was a request to waive tipping fees for a family who recently lost their home in a fire and don’t have the means to pay for disposal of the burnt materials.

Interim CAO Dan McDougall said other municipalities have a compassionate fund to assist people in this situation and suggested Queens could do the same. After discussing the matter, council requested staff come back with a report on how the compassionate fund could work in Queens.

The final item up for discussion was the creation of a Police Advisory Board.

By law, each municipality must have Police Advisory Board.

According to the staff presentation, “…Council has been the governance body acting as the Police Advisory Board with the understanding that this approach had received approval from the Minister of Justice at the time when this practice started. However, written approval from the Minister of Justice (pursuant to section 57(8) of the Police Act) for this governance model has not been located.”

One of the recommendations that came out of the Mass Casualty Commission Report in March was that “Municipalities and the Province of Nova Scotia should ensure that police boards and police advisory boards are fully staffed and performing their governance function.”

The Region of Queens was notified by the Department of Justice in May that they will need to establish a stand-alone Police Advisory Board. Staff are now working to get a board in place by September.

The next Region of Queens Council meeting will be held July 11, beginning at 9:00am in council chambers.

E-mail: edhalversonnews@gmail.com

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