community volume 18, issue 3winter 2017 newsl… · on january 13, 2017, billy sparks was...

Community Law Currents Winter 2017

WHAT’S INSIDE 2 Interview with our newest Staff Lawyer

3 Congratulations to Nicole & Ross!

4 Giving Tuesday Results

6 Alumni News 8 The Social Justice Soiree

12 Annual General Meeting

14 Staff News

COMMUNITY VOLUME 18, ISSUE 3 Winter 2017

LAW CURRENTS

From left back: Rich Robertson, Mary Anne MacDonald, Jessica Patrick, Jason Smith, Gordon Gear, Morgan Knickle-Smith, Katie Brousseau. From front left: Marcia Davis, Angela Simmonds, Sarah Pinsent, Kym Sweeny, Raelynn Mechelse, Drew MacQuarrie and tucked behind Drew is Acinkoj Magok.

Meet the Winter 2017 clinic students!

Community Law Currents Winter 2017 2

On January 13, 2017, Billy Sparks was officially called to the Bar in Nova Scotia. In doing so, he became Dalhousie Legal Aid’s newest staff law-yer and completed a journey that he began as a Clinic student in the summer of 2015. Want to know more about Billy? If you do, today is your lucky day because Billy recently sat down for an interview with Jason Smith, current clinic student and temporary co-editor of Community Currents. So, without further ado, we present Mr. Billy Sparks: Jason: Why did you decide to pursue a career with

Dal legal aid? Billy: I’ve been a resident of the local community for about 20 years. I thought it would be a good way to give back. I was also a Clinic student when I was in law school and I never wanted to leave. So, I joined the Board and did my articles here. What is your fondest memory from your time as a

Clinic student? Billy: The first client that said she was happy she had a good lawyer, even though I wasn’t a law-yer. Now that you’re a real lawyer, have you had your

“welcome to the show” moment? Billy: Yes. When I got my notary seal and I nota-rized everything in my house, including the toilet paper. What are some of your long-term career goals? Billy: I plan to continue at Dalhousie Legal Aid. I also hope to do a Graduate program in mental health and addictions. Everyone has childhood dreams. Was yours to become a lawyer? Billy: No. When I was a kid, I didn’t want to do anything. I’ve been working full-time since I was 12 so, when I was a kid, I wanted to grow up to be a kid. I didn’t want to be an adult at all. What would 10-year-old Billy say if he saw you now?


Billy: What a nerd! Nice cardigan nerd! Complete this sentence, when I’m not working at Dal legal aid, you can find me______________. Billy: Playing badminton What is your ideal vacation? Billy: To cross the Atlantic Ocean, on a large cargo container ship, with nobody else on it. Is that weird? If you had the choice between doing one large family law file or 100 Residential Tenancy hearings,

which would you choose? Billy: 100 Residential Tenancy hearings. Of all the Dal legal aid lawyers and staff, who’s bad side would you least want to be on? Billy: Lynette (front staff). She scares me. If someone were considering making a donation to Dalhousie Legal Aid, what would you tell them to

seal the deal? Billy: Come on in and look around. Boxers or briefs? Billy: I don’t think that’s an appropriate question. But, briefs. What is your favorite hockey team? Billy: The Halifax Mooseheads What is your favorite food? Billy: Pepperoni, cheese, and crackers

Congratulations to Legal Assistant Nicole Wolfe and

her partner Ross Larder who welcomed their first child, Lydia Elizabeth on

February 28 at 2pm.

We’re thrilled to welcome the newest member of our

little family!


Community Law Currents is published approximately three times each year by: Dalhousie Legal Aid Service (DLAS). The contents are largely written by students of the Schulich School of Law at Dalhousie University who are participating in DLAS’

Clinical Law program, with additional content by lawyers and staff of DLAS.

This issue was edited by Clinical Law Student Jason Smith and DLAS Office Manager Reena Davis

Visit our website at: http://law.dal.ca/dlas

Brian Maltman Charles Sterns

Colin MacDonald Dean Camille Cameron

Dinyar Marzban Dr Aldo E Chircop Evelyn Barkhouse

Harold M Smith, QC Harry McFettridge

In Memory of Dianne Pothier Janice Beaton

Jennifer Ko Lorraine Lafferty

Mary Anne Burke-Matheson President Richard Florizone

Richard L Evans Ronald A Stockton

Scott Sterns Ted McFetridge

Wayne MacKay, QC William Sullivan

Yvonne LaHaye, QC

Thank you to everyone who donated during our Giving Tuesday Campaign held on November 29, 2016. We raised money for a student lounge this year. We had a goal of $5000 for the lounge and ended up raising over $9000! We have deep gratitude for our supporters. Special thanks to the following donors who gave $200 or more toward this great initiative. A few pics of the lounge (which is hard to capture—we encourage you to drop in) follow on page 5.


Congratulations to all of our Clinic Students graduating from the Schulich School of Law this spring!


Lauren Mills Taylor was a DLAS student in Fall 2015. After graduating from Dal Law last May, she moved back to her hometown of Calgary to work at the Alberta Court of Appeal. She says “Clerking has been a great way to start my articles. There's an inter-esting variety of work and it is really exciting to see your research help shape the law. There are a lot of self-represented litigants who come through the court, and my work at the clinic has allowed me to better un-derstand the particular challenges they face. I finish up my term at the Court of Appeal at the end of March, when I move to a local firm in Calgary to finish articles. But my clerking adventure does not end there - In Au-gust, I am heading to Ottawa to clerk for Justice Rowe at the Supreme Court of Canada. I am eager to see how the country's top court approaches access to jus-tice issues”.

Julian Dickinson and his wife Natalie Brothers-Dickinson welcomed their third son, Marcus, on March 26!

Alumni News

Clinic Alumnus Paul Wadden and his wife Hrefna welcomed their first daughter, Bella on December 22th!


Esher Madhur (DLAS fall 2015) will serve as a clerk to the (as yet unknown) Justice who will be appointed to take Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin's seat when she retires in the fall of 2018. Esher is currently clerking at the Su-preme Court of British Columbia in Vancouver and will complete her articles at Hunter Litigation Chambers in Vancouver before moving to Ottawa in 2018.

Clinic Alumnae Amelia Cooke married Aaron Donovan, on February 18. Congrats!

Hey Alumni! Do you have any news to share with us? We’d love to hear from you! Email [email protected] with your stories, photos and news of any kind!

Leah Burt will be clerking for Justice Suzanne Côté in 2018-19. Originally from Stephenville, NL, Leah currently resides in Ottawa. After grad-uating from Dal in 2014, Leah articled with Legal Aid Ontario and clerked for Justice Robert Barnes at the Federal Court. She is currently legal counsel at Indigenous and Northern Affairs Legal Services in the Department of Justice. Leah is a lawyer mentor with Level Justice’s Indigenous Youth Outreach Program and sits on the board of the Ticket Defence Program."


The Social Justice Soirée Reena Davis

This year’s Social Justice Soiree was better than ever! We were honoured to have Senator Wanda Thomas Bernard with us this year to give a key note speech consisting of her thoughts on social justice. She spoke of the roots of so-cial justice here in Nova Scotia, of the continuing work to be done and of “critical hope” which she says is what gets us out to fight another day. Her speech had moments of warmth, humour, insight and the wisdom we suspected would come from a woman with a long history of dealing with issues around racism, diversity, inclusiveness and human rights. The Youth Advocate Program took home the Irving and Ruth Pink Award for Youth Development and Social Justice this year. The Youth Advocate Program works with youth aged 9-15 as well as their primary care-givers and anyone else who has the youths’ best interests at heart. The goal is to increase the ability of youth and parents to make better choices by

celebrating successes, building confidence, resiliency, pro-social skills and by en-

gaging them in constructive behaviours with family, school and community.

DeRico Symmonds, Project Director, accepted the award on behalf of the youth Advocate Program. He reminded us of the need to take action in the world, rather than simply talk about the issues. We were thrilled to have Darryl Pink back to present the award this year, and Pink Larkin to show their support as a table sponsor. The Schulich School of Law also had staff and faculty in attendance as did Cox and Palmer Law. This year we had our first ever art battle. Four artists joined us and painted their concept of social justice on canvas, which we auctioned at the end of the even-ing. Half of the proceeds from the auction went to Dal Legal Aid while the artists chose which charity would receive the other half. Money was raised for Phoenix Youth’s SPIN program, The Mount Saint Vincent Fine Arts Society and The Canadian Paraplegic Association. We would like to give special thanks to those businesses who partnered with us this year to provide items that were auctioned or raffled to attendees. The event raised just over $2000 this year, up a bit from last year.


Agricola Street Brasserie Atlantic Film Festival Bespoke Clinic Chatters Hair Studio Dancing with Michel & Company Freeman’s Little New York Gael Tours Go North Tours/Uncorked NS Glen Arbour Golf Club Gourmandises Avenue Chocolate Lindt Chocolate Little Oak Wine~Spirits~Food Magic Mountain Maritime Chiropractic Maritime Museum of the Atlantic Maritime Centre Mall

Maverick’s Mens Salon Moksha Yoga Mountain Gap Resort Murphy’s Cable Wharf Pete’s Frootique RIO Pilates Sweet Hereafter Cheesecakery Symphony Nova Scotia The Black Market The Cake Lady The Nook The Wooden Monkey Ukpik Inuit Art Wheaton’s Your Father’s Moustache

More pics on page 11...

Soiree photos courtesy James McIntosh Photography

DeRico Symmonds accepts the award

Senator Wanda Thomas Bernard gives her speech

Our Business partners:

Sculpture donated by Ukpik Inuit Art


Student Spotlight: Angela Simmonds By Jason Smith

For many law students, a semester at Dal Legal Aid provides an opportunity to give back to the local community. It’s four months of feel-good, soul-fulfilling work that earns you a pat on the back for a job well done. But after it’s over, most of us are off to work at a law firm and the opportunities to use our skills for the good of the community take a back seat to career development. But for current clinic student Angela Simmonds, help-ing her community has become something of a lifelong project. Angela currently sits on the North Preston Land Recovery Initiative, where she has spent the last three years helping the descendants of Black Loyalists in North Preston. Many residents of this largely African Nova Scotian community are at risk of losing land that was given to their ancestors some 200 years ago. The problem is that although they were given the land, no legal deeds were issued by the government. This means the land cannot be legally passed on to family members and can be sold off by the Crown. It also makes it hard to settle disputes between resi-dents who both claim ownership of a piece of land. Applications for land title registration can take up to 20 years, meaning that some residents die before the process is com-pleted. Members of the legal community have diligently volunteered their time to resolving the issue and the community has been grateful. But according to Angela, an African Nova Scotian herself, the Province is not shouldering their fair share of the load. As she told CBC, “It should not be up to community members and it should not be up to volunteers… to fix a problem that was brought to the community by the province, who are still sitting back and watching as other professionals step up.” And Angela would know. The Department of Natural Resources hired her in 2016 to study obstacles faced by North Preston residents in applying for land title clarification. She authored a 25-page report, which offered recommendations to make the applica-tion process easier for residents. Her recommendations included steps aimed at ad-dressing financial and cultural barriers. Many of these applications date back 20 years. But in order for there to be real change, Angela believes that the province needs to pri-oritize residents of North Preston. As she told CBC, "There's millions and billions of dol-lars being allotted to other industries ... so that people can economically benefit," she said. "Except for North Preston." But there are signs that the winds of change may be blowing. In February, the Depart-ment told CBC that they have assigned more staff to work on the land title applications. They are also working to establish relationships with the lawyers helping North Preston Residents. As for Angela, she will continue working with the North Preston Land Recovery Initiative as part of her role as an Articled Clerk with Nova Scotia Legal Aid.


Dal Legal Aid Annual General Meeting By: Reena Davis

The Dalhousie Legal Aid Annual General Meeting was held on March 16 this year. During the meeting we had a panel discussion around street checks. On the panel were Rickcola Brinton, then Managing Lawyer of Nova Scotia Legal Aid youth Office, Jean-Michel Blais, Halifax Regional Municipality Chief of Po-lice and Lana MacLean, practicing social worker. Moderating was Professor Archie Kaiser of the Schulich School of Law. According to a press release put out by HRM on January 9 (https://apps.halifax.ca/news/article/4139) a street check is “an entry in our system of when an officer witnesses possible suspicious activity, observes something, and/or interacts with someone that may be of significance to investigations. The information entered into our system as a street check is used as intelli-gence to help prevent, detect and solve crime in our community”. Data re-vealed at the same time showed that black men in HRM are three times more likely than whites to be subject to street checks. While Chief Blais defended the act of street checks as a necessary tool in po-licing, there was a great deal of concern from community members in the room. One of the issues raised was whether street checks being the basis for more patrols was a self fulfilling scenario and somewhat circular – more street checks are recorded in a certain area meaning there are more patrols in that area and this leads to more street checks. Lana MacLean spoke to the damaging psychological effects on black youth. She said street checks criminalize black youth and creates trauma and distrust of police officers from an early age. “When you are eight on a bicycle, a police officer has a tremendous amount of authority over you,” she said. “Your mother or your father have already had ‘the talk’ … you are at a higher risk than a white child to get stopped. That has happened to my nephew, riding his bicycle down North Street going home from Oxford School. That shifted something in him.”

Rickcola Brinton explained that depending on the situation, a person has to an-swer the questions the officer asks. For example, in the circumstance that


someone is being detained, you must answer what the police officer is asking. However, she pointed out that people often don’t know that street checks don’t require people to answer questions asked by a police officer.

While the issues of street checks are extremely complex as was emphasized by all panel members, they are issues with much exploration still to be done. Chief Blais acknowledged the fact that racism still exists within Nova Scotia

and within the police department, but still felt that street checks were an im-portant part of job. There seems to be some differing views on whether the practice should be put on pause to work out better solutions to the issues sur-rounding it. The way forward was not clear when the meeting ended.

We would like to thank the panel members for their time as well as the student organizers Angela Simmonds, Brent Murphy and Fabian Suarez-Amaya for an excellent job!

Audience members crowd the room during the DLAS Annual General Meeting. Photo courtesy of Genevieve Nickel


Congratulations to staff lawyer Sue Young! She and Chris

Mosher married in Sanibel, Florida on April 15th.

B on Voyage to Shawna Hoyte QC, Staff Lawyer who has taken a leave from DLAS and is undertaking PhD studies at Memorial Uni-versity beginning in early May. As an multidisciplinary and inter-professional practitioner Shawna’s research area is in epignetics and trauma specific to child protection and criminal law. Shawna will be back in Nova Scotia in 2018. Shawna will be greatly missed at the clinic by the staff and the community. We wish her all the best and have every con-fidence that this will be an excellent experience for her.


Shawna Hoyte QC, PhD ( c ), MSW RSW will present a paper to the National Organi-zation of Forensic Social Work ( NOFSW) in Boston, MA at the National Conference 2017 entitled, “Access to Justice: Promising Practices in the Pursuit of Justice in Sen-tencing Procedures: A Case Study”. The paper will present an analysis of the use of Cultural Assessment Reports in the Nova Scotia Courts. Reference will be made to R. V. Gabriel ( 2017 ) and R. v. X ( 2014).

Hold the date!

The Links for Legal Aid Golf Tournament will be held on Saturday, September 30 at beautiful Glen Arbour Golf Club.

We’ll be holding contests, having a meal and just generally having a good time. All in support of Dalhousie Legal Aid. Come out and see if you can get the trophy away from last year’s winning team from Nova Scotia Power!

Proudly sponsored by:

Law school has taught me new ways to think. My time at the clinic has taught me new ways to understand. ~Winter 2017 Clinic Student

Student Quotes:

My year at DLAS has been the most challenging, rewarding, and engaging experience of my life. It has been a privilege to be a part of the incredible work and advocacy be-ing done here. I have seen first-hand how systemic barriers are affecting my commu-nity and am driven to work with the community to address these issues. I am certain my future practice will forever be influenced by my time at the clinic and I am so grate-ful for the opportunity to be a part of it.

~ Katie Brousseau Social Work Student, DLAS

Currently we represent low-income clients in a number of ways:

Deal with family law problems such as custody, access, support, and child protection;

Provide advice and advocacy to clients regarding family benefits or social assistance matters;

Represent tenants in Residential Tenancies matters;

Represent young people charged under the YCJA where Nova Scotia Legal Aid cannot because of a conflict of interest;

Provide advice/information to people with debt problems such as student loans and Nova Scotia Power cut-offs;

Provide legal information and advice to community organizations and groups like tenants’ organizations, transition houses, and anti-poverty groups;

Serve as a teaching clinic for third-year law students who want to learn the practical side of the law.

WHAT WE DON’T DO: Personal injuries, civil claims for damages, criminal matters for adults, property, immigration, or wrongful dismissal. DLAS has six lawyers on staff: Donna Franey (Executive Director), Shawna Hoyte, Q.C., Heather McNeill, Q.C. (on secondment until July 1 2017), Susanne Litke (on leave until Oc-tober 2017), Sue Young and Billy Sparks. Also on staff are two community legal workers, Me-gan Deveaux and Fiona Traynor; an Office Man-ager, Reena Davis, as well as four administrative staff, Lynette Colley, Nicole Wolfe (on mater-nity leave until february2018), Cathy Leiper, and Melinda Shaw.

Dalhousie Legal Aid Service is a legal aid office providing access to legal representation to individuals and groups

who would otherwise not be able to afford a lawyer

Dalhousie Legal Aid Service

A Community Service of Dalhousie University

since 1970

2209 Gottingen Street Halifax, NS B3K 3B5

Phone: 902.423.8105 Fax: 902.422.8067

Website

http://law.dal.ca/dlas

community volume 18, issue 3winter 2017 newsl… · on january 13, 2017, billy sparks was...

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