Councillor Brad Bradford laced up and got on the ice with our campers

On the morning of Monday 16 March, Brad Bradford walked into Ted Reeve Community Arena and turned left, towards the dressing room, rather than right, towards the stands. That is the whole story in one sentence, and everything below is detail.

Bradford is the city councillor for Beaches-East York. Ted Reeve is in his ward, and so are several of the neighbourhoods our campers come from. He spent the opening session on the ice alongside Cameron Gaunce and our founder Andrew Adair, working with children who, in a number of cases, had never worn skates before that morning.

“Everybody started like this, just how you’re starting right now,” he told them. “Lacing them up and getting out there for the first time.”

In the dryland block he sat down beside Gaunce for an unscripted question and answer session. The campers asked what leadership means, what a councillor actually does, and whether he had ever been frightened of trying something new. Nobody had given them a list of questions, which is why the answers were worth hearing.

“Andrew’s initiative to bring people together and give them access to ice time, equipment, coaching and professionals is something that’s truly special,” Bradford said. “Whether you pursue hockey as something you want to do regularly, or you just want to learn and grow from taking those first strokes on the ice, building your resilience and your character, I trust this camp will be something you remember forever.”

Beach Metro Community News covered the visit, and their photographer Jessica Shackleton took the group photograph that has become the defining image of the March Break Camp. Bradford also shared the camp with his constituency through his own channels.

For Adair, the significance was not the photograph. “Having a city councillor come to our camp, get on the ice and tell our kids directly that they matter, that is something these children will carry with them,” he says. “It validates everything we are building.”

It is also a marker of something else. What started as one high school student’s project has now drawn in elected officials, professional athletes and national newsrooms, inside a single year.

“Brad did not come to observe,” Adair says. “He came to participate. That tells you everything about the kind of support this community is giving us.”

Everybody started like this, just how you're starting right now. Lacing them up and getting out there for the first time.