Top 20 under 40

Some of the best and brightest in the Thunder Bay region walked the red carpet at the first Northern Ontario Visionary Awards.

The inaugural NOVA awards hosted by Thunder Bay Chamber of Commerce and SHIFT Thunder Bay had more than 200 guests attended the ceremony at Fort William Historical Park on Saturday. The awards ceremony celebrated individuals who showed leadership in their communities and in their personal lives. From 66 nominees, 20 award winners received a plaque at the ceremony including Dougall Media’s own Jake Satten.

Chantal Brochu was the first to receive an award that night. The 35-year-old mother of two said she never thought she would be accepting an award like this.

“It feels amazing, I’m quite honoured to have people think that I’ve accomplished a lot in such a short period of time,” Brochu said. “You don’t quite step back to think about it yourself and when have people nominating you it’s an honour and it’s hard to describe how you feel being nominated for this kind of an award.”

Brochu graduate from law school when she was 23 years old and has since established herself as a lawyer in Thunder Bay. She said she’s one of the few bilingual lawyers in the city

She said giving back to the community was always something she wanted to do and hoped to pass on those values to her children.
“You never think of it as extraordinary,” she said.

Artist Elliott Doxtater-Wynn joked his children would probably be indifferent when he brought home his award but said he was happy to have won.

“It’s a rush,” Doxtater-Wynn said. “I didn’t know what to expect. This is a big gala event and I’ve been a part of big projects but nothing like this. Coming to an event like this we were joking around that I felt like Bruce Wayne. This group that’s assembled here today is the group that’s out there in the community.”

He said the people at the event were the ones who were going to be the leaders in shaping Thunder Bay and he never thought he would be one of them. He said all he wants to do is be a role model for his children.

But as his children grow more confident, Doxtater-Wynn said he’s expanding who he’s helping.

“I work in the schools, I’m trying to help student’s focus on what they want to accomplish,” he said.

Michael Nitz, chair of the board of directors for the Thunder Bay Chamber of Commerce, said they didn’t have nominees broken up by region and it just so happened that the ones receiving the awards were from all across Northern Ontario.

The awards took two years to create and Nitz said he hoped that it could become an annual event.

“We decided we really wanted to celebrate that young talent in Northwestern Ontario,” Nitz said. “The one thing people think is there is this outward migration of our youth. Sure a lot of people move away for post-secondary education but they end up coming back in their late 20s early 30s and they are really active in the community. We just want to celebrate that.”

The other nominees who won awards were:

• Marcia Arpin

• Stephanie Ash

• Doug Carlson

• Justin Frape

• Keely Hartviksen

• Genevieve Knauff

• Jason Komoski

• Herp Lamba

• Joseph LeBlanc

• Duncan F. Macgillivray

• Matt Simeoni

• Jonah Dupuis from Nipigon

• Shy-Anne Hovorka from Nipigon

• Sean Irwin from Terrace Bay

• Neil McLeod from Dryden

• Eric Pietsch from Geraldton

• Jon Thompson from Kenora