By Maisha Hasan, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter

Despite the big push towards increasing the visibility of mental health challenges in recent years, in our suburban spaces, we still need a bigger push towards conversations surrounding mental health and the help that can be provided. And now, a group of young Burlington residents are making a stand against the silence that surrounds mental health challenges — or more accurately, not standing at all, but running. 

On Aug. 15 at Lowville Park, Community Minds, the students’ non-profit organization, held a charity run to raise funds for the Canadian Mental Health Association of Halton, a provider of mental health services locally. 

Community Minds is dedicated to leading fundraising projects that help the organizations that need it most. One of the group leaders, Adam Neto, who is from North Burlington himself and studies at Queen’s University, has seen what can happen when mental health struggles are not sufficiently addressed. He has known two students whose lives have been tragically cut short due to struggles with mental health. 

In response, Adam and his Community Minds team, including Max Norman (a Guelph University student), Aiden Dawson (a University of Toronto student), and fellow Queen’s student Zack Stevenson, created this event. The run was a hit, with the two-hour event including over 70 runners, visitors, and donors. The Canadian Mental Health Association of Halton (CMHA) was a key guest, being the recipient of all funds raised at the event. Other special guests included Burlington Ward 3 Councillor Rory Nisan, who helped advise on the project. 

Sydney Taran, a representative of CMHA Halton, spoke to the crowd and gave insights and details into her organization. CMHA Halton offers a range of mental health supports, from working with Halton Regional Police Service to provide the COAST Mobile Outreach Team, to offering free single-session counselling over the phone, along with case management services and other concurrent services.

Burlington’s Julie Cole helped promote the event, becoming an ongoing partner of Community Minds through her business and other forms. There was also Mike Desjardins, founder of Burlington Helping Burlington. Desjardins used his site to spread the word throughout multiple Burlington neighbourhoods, encouraging more people to join in. 

A most important guest was Michelle Podd, proud mother of Baxter Podd, who sadly took his own life at the age of fifteen. Since then, Podd has spent her time advocating for mental health and promoting love, setting up merchandise based on Baxter’s beautiful artwork at the run, something she will also do at future events. Podd is also about to launch a new website called BaxterWuzHere.com to honour her son’s request to “spread love to people who need it.” 

The community gathered and showed support and willingness towards conversations surrounding mental health, resulting in Community Minds surpassing their fundraising goal of $2000, instead raising $2822, all going towards the Canadian Mental Health Association of Halton. 

You can still support Community Minds’ fundraising efforts by clicking here to donate to CMHA of Halton. For more information on Community Minds, visit @communitymindsburlington on Instagram, or Community Minds on Facebook. 

Update: this article has been updated to reflect the full names of the Community Minds team.