White Macgillivray Lester LLP Hosts Helmets on Kids Event
From left to right: Duncan Macgillivray, Jeff Moorley and Jacob Javor, White Macgillivray Lester LLP.
On Friday, June 19, 2026, lawyers and staff from White Macgillivray Lester LLP returned to a Thunder Bay schoolyard for one of the firm’s favourite days of the year. This time the setting was Westmount Public School, where every one of the school’s students went home with a brand-new, properly fitted bicycle helmet and a renewed message about keeping their heads safe.
The event is part of OTLA’s Helmets on Kids program, and 2026 marked White Macgillivray Lester LLP’s 15th year helping bring it to Thunder Bay. The firm was joined by their long-standing community partners: the Brain Injury Association of Thunder Bay and Area (BIATBA) and the Thunder Bay District Health Unit, whose team delivered a hands-on bike-safety presentation before the helmets came out. As in past years, the local effort was coordinated by White Macgillivray Lester LLP’s partner Duncan Macgillivray, OTLA’s Helmets on Kids Coordinator for Thunder Bay and a past president of BIATBA.
The timing is deliberate.
June is Brain Injury Awareness Month and there is no better moment to put helmets on kids than right before summer, when bikes come out across Northwestern Ontario.
Volunteers spent the morning unboxing helmets, sizing them one child at a time and checking that each fit was snug and correct — because a helmet only protects a child if it is worn properly.
This work is personal. As personal injury lawyers, we see first-hand what a serious head injury can do to a child and a family. Helmets are one of the simplest, most effective tools we have to prevent that harm and helping a gym full of kids gear up for a safer summer is a genuine privilege.
“As personal injury lawyers, we see what a head injury can do to a child and to a family. A properly fitted helmet is one of the simplest things that can prevent that kind of harm. Handing one to every student in the school — and watching their faces light up — is honestly one of the best days of our year.”
— Jeff Moorley, Partner, White Macgillivray Lester LLP
Since OTLA members launched Helmets on Kids in 2002, the program has distributed more than 45,000 bicycle helmets to elementary students across Ontario. White Macgillivray Lester LLP is proud to have grown the Thunder Bay chapter alongside BIATBA since 2012 and prouder still of every kid who rode off this summer a little safer.