Blaine Cameron: effective advocate, fierce hockey player

This is a slightly expanded version of the story that appeared in the November 2021 print edition of The BUZZ.

Alayne McGregor

A tireless advocate whose victories improved people’s lives. A fine friend. A fierce wheelchair hockey player.

Those are some of the ways Centretown activist Blaine Cameron is remembered. Cameron, 48, died October 15 from heart failure.

He worked for accessible Internet, affordable housing, and disability rights, and was a familiar face for almost a decade with Ottawa ACORN, the organization of low- to moderate-income families, where he chaired the central Ottawa chapter. He also worked on many NDP election campaigns.

Cameron lived for many years near Bank and Cooper; he returned recently to live with his parents because of problems obtaining personal support workers. He was affected by Becker muscular dystrophy and used a powered wheelchair – but despite that was a regular at every ACORN march, meeting, or fundraiser. His friend Ray Noyes said that Cameron considered the wheelchair “the best thing ever” because it gave him so much more mobility and freedom, compared to getting around with two canes.

On October 27, MPP Joel Harden paid tribute to Cameron in the Ontario Legislature, describing him as “a leader in our city” and talking about his first success: winning $250,000 in rent rebates for tenants in his former building in Vanier, where he had been trapped for months in a cockroach-ridden apartment because of a broken elevator. He was living there nine years ago when an ACORN organizer knocked on his door and persuaded him to work with the organization.

“He helped win increases in the asset limits for ODSP recipients. He fought for hikes in Ottawa’s affordable housing spending, and he helped win a national program, the Connecting Families Program, which offers low-income families $10-a-month Internet. And that’s reached 200,000 families across Canada,” Harden said.

Cameron also pushed for improved tenant protection in city bylaws, which culminated in the city’s new Rental Housing Property Management By-law and pest and vermin control regulations which came into effect this summer. More recently, he was working on an Internet For All campaign for an affordable city broadband Internet program, like that now being piloted in Toronto. In 2015, he appeared before the House of Commons Standing Committee on Finance to explain how access to affordable Internet was a lifeline.

On October 30 in Jack Purcell Park, about 50 friends and family members gathered for a celebration of life for Cameron. The event included a community canvass for rent control, Harden said, because “that’s what Blaine would have wanted.”

A tribute on ACORN’s website described Cameron as a “dream leader – fearless, humble, and dedicated to the fight for social and economic justice.”

As a leader, “he was unfailingly encouraging and kind to other members,” Noyes said. “He wouldn’t just say you did a good job: he would break it down and analyze exactly what you had done well, and comment on what your strengths are, what your knowledge is, what your abilities are, on how you bring all that to the table. He was very thoughtful. He was very skilled at leading a meeting. He knew how to handle someone who was talking out of turn or taking over the conversation without hurting anyone’s feelings. It all came down to his kindness and his tendency to want to be encouraging for other members.”

Noyes said Cameron loved books, movies, and chess. They loved chatting in person and over the phone about politics and philosophy and theology and psychology, and especially social justice. “He was my friend and my buddy and he was a good guy to talk to.”

One of his biggest passions was playing hockey in his wheelchair. He joined the Ottawa Power Wheelchair Hockey League in 2012.

League representative Donna Haycock said that Cameron was “a gentleman [and] a fierce competitor” who quickly developed “an insatiable love and passion” for the sport.

He was named the league’s Top Defensive Forward for four years running (2014-17) and played competitively in tournaments across North America. He was also a vocal leader on the court, and a mentor to younger players.

In 2015, he helped the league’s team win a silver medal at the national championships by scoring a tie-breaking goal with 53 seconds remaining in the 3rd period to send the game into a shootout.

What Noyes will miss most is just the fact that Cameron is “not there at the other end of the phone line anymore.It’s surprising how stunned and empty you feel when someone you expect it to be around for a long time is suddenly gone.”