Announcing 2021/2022 Community Builder Award 

At a special event held on September 14 at The Broom Factory, the Community Foundation for Kingston & Area was honoured to announce that Jim Brown & Joan Lee have been named our 2021/2022 Community Builder Award recipients.

Jim Brown and Joan Lee are passionate community builders in the truest sense of the word. For well over 20 years, they have supported underserved populations and community causes and programs throughout the Kingston area. Their commitments include increasing access to education, caring for the health needs of our citizens, promoting the arts, and, most recently, mobilizing our community to recognize and address the climate emergency. They truly care about the community they call home and advocate for, volunteer for, and philanthropically support causes they believe in. They are addressing the climate emergency and its impact on vulnerable populations head on with both philanthropic support, and personal advocacy and education. They believe in the ability to effect change by providing support to the people and programs that make our communities better. They truly embody the spirit that together we thrive.

Joan Lee and Jim Brown have supported and engaged with local various charities, including Community Foundation for Kingston & Area (CFKA), St. Lawrence College, Kingston Regional Arts Council; Kingston Literacy, Chinese Canadian Association of Kingston & District, Museum of Health Care at Kingston; Kingston Community health Centre, Pathways to education, United Way KFL&A. Jim last served the Board of the Kingston Community Health Centres.

Loyal donors through CFKA since the 1990s, Jim and Joan have established numerous funds with us to better our community, including the James S. And Grace Brown Memorial Youth Advantage Fund, Henry Lee & Loretta Lee Memorial Legacy Fund, and The Climate Crisis Fund, which collectively seek to support areas such as youth education, truth and reconciliation, newcomers, local food security, energy and other initiatives that seek to prevent and or alleviate further hardships.

Joan and Jim are motivated by the fact that climate hardship is felt first and most by our most vulnerable community members and that the climate crisis will be the defining driving force in everyone’s lives this century. To energize the community about climate change, they have purchased books for library programs, sponsored guest speakers, and donated funds to programs addressing this critical issue, as well as advocated with countless individuals and organizations to make addressing the urgency a priority conversation.

Jim is the retired President of Brown’s Fine Food Services Inc. that has provided food services, catering, hospitality, retirement dining services and thrift items to organizations throughout the region and Joan retired from Queen’s Faculty of Health Sciences.

About the Community Builder Award