Halifax Community News

After months of searching, the Out of the Cold emergency winter shelter has a new home. On Monday, the shelter moved from St. Matthew’s United Church on Barrington Street to its new digs on College Street.

The boxing program for people with Parkinson’s was piloted in June 2019 and was an immediate success. It started with eight regulars throughout the summer. Now, there are new people showing up every week.

Shelter Movers Nova Scotia helps three to four women move their belongings each week and hopes to have 150 local volunteers by its one-year anniversary in July.

A Nova Scotia wildlife rescue centre is overwhelmed — and grateful — for a last-minute blitz of Christmas tree donations during the first weekend of January. For the first time since it started collecting eight years ago, Hope for Wildlife was concerned it wouldn’t have enough evergreens for its winter patients, who use them as snacks, shelter from the wind and hiding spots while they heal.

The sudden death last fall of a 15-year-old athlete and volunteer firefighter from Lantz, N.S., has prompted fundraising efforts in his honour aimed at outfitting area schools with life-saving automated external defibrillators. Braeden Bannister's family still doesn't know what exactly caused him to collapse and die following an evening hunting trip Nov. 1, but they suspect it was a cardiac arrest.

The cold hard facts about youth mental illness were in the spotlight Saturday morning at Point Pleasant Park. Dozens of hardy supporters of Jack.org plunged into the frigid Halifax Harbour after raising more than $10,000 for the organization’s national “Brainfreeze” polar bear dip campaign. It's the first time the event has been held in Halifax. Some participants banded into teams with names such as the Cheetahs and Future Physicians.