| Halldor
wins one of the Coast Mental Health Foundation’s 2005
“Courage to Come Back” Awards:
Halldor Bjarnason, 41, of Vancouver, is the
2005 Courage to Come Back Award recipient in the Inspirational
Achievement category.
Halldor was born in Winnipeg with cerebral palsy, a birth
condition caused by damage to the brain’s motor function,
resulting in uncoordinated movements and a speech impairment.
He dreamed of being a lawyer. After Queen’s University
law school, he articled at a large Toronto law firm, passing
the Ontario bar exam in 1991. Five of 16 articling students
were hired back by the firm; Halldor wasn’t one of them.
He moved to Vancouver and worked at a job outside the legal
field. After being called to the B.C. Bar in 1993, he got
a term contract as a lawyer with the Labour Relations Board.
Unable to get work practicing law after that, Halldor did
free-lance research for other lawyers while managing the affairs
of the Cerebral Palsy Association. By 1999, he was practicing
law by himself with an increasing emphasis on wills, trusts
and estates.
Halldor joined Access Law Group - an association of lawyers
who share expenses and resources - in 2003. He deals primarily
with the families of people who have a disability and is noted
for staging 30-40 seminars each year on estate planning. He
is chair of the Law Society’s Disability Advisory Committee
and sits on a number of volunteer boards. He has taught at
UBC and Langara College and has received numerous accolades
including a Governor-General’s medal and the Terry Fox
Humanitarian Award.
Halldor is an active cyclist (using a trike) and a former
Paralympic gold medalist (Seoul, 1988), a dedicated walker
and hiker. He will receive his Courage to Come Back Award
at the seventh annual gala dinner on Thursday, April 28 at
the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Vancouver. Tickets are available
from the Coast Mental Health Foundation at (604) 872-3502
or through the web site: buy
online or download
ticket order form (PDF).
Changes to the Income Tax Act
March 2003 – Changes to the Income Tax
Act now permit parents and grandparents, upon their death,
to have their RRSPs or RIFs rolled into a trust, on a tax-deferred
basis, for the benefit of their financially dependent child/grandchild
– providing the child/grandchild has a physical or mental
disability. The definition of a “financially dependent”
person has also been changed, increasing the maximum annual
income from $7800 to $13,810. As a result, this provision
is now applicable to most people receiving provincial disability
benefits. Contact Halldor for more information.
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