Newmarket citizen of the year makes local hearts happy

An ordinary volunteer with an extraordinary gift of bringing people together around a common cause has been named Newmarket’s 2019 citizen of the year.

Julie Cochrane, who founded the citizens' group Heart of Newmarket to save the downtown’s historic Clock Tower and preserve Main Street, said history, heritage and a passion for the arts drives her community involvement.

“I’m just an average volunteer, an ordinary person,” Cochrane said Thursday during an interview in her Botsford Street heritage home that she faithfully brought back to its former splendour. “The honour is seriously overwhelming, and it’s wonderful. But, I guess, when you add on the layer that I have cancer and I’ve been really trying to present myself as a leader and to let people know that cancer isn’t necessarily a death sentence or something you have to be depressed about, I think they wanted to highlight that.”

When Cochrane was first diagnosed in 2015, she was told she had stage 1 breast cancer. She said that misdiagnosis was discovered in 2017 when she learned it had been stage 4 the whole time and had metastasized.

“I just decided I was going to look at every way possible to beat this thing,” she said. “Stage 4 is considered terminal, but I will not believe that for one second and I’m doing everything possible so I can get past it and help other people through it.”

Best friend and longtime Newmarket resident, Tracee Chambers, who nominated Cochrane for the honour, said with a laugh that her friend is too humble.

The pair met in chemotherapy in 2015, and went from being virtual strangers to “two baldies together”. They discovered they lived a street apart from each other in downtown Newmarket, were both entrepreneurs, shared much in common, yet had never met before “this unique thing called cancer”, Chambers said.

About the nomination, Chambers said she came in at the later part of Cochrane’s eight-year term as president of the Newmarket Group of Artists, and witnessed the impact she made.

“The huge amount of hours this woman spent coordinating, organizing, emailing, and organizing photo shoots, it was endless what she did all behind the scenes,” Chambers said. “She’s not one of the artists so she doesn’t get the glory, she was in the background making it happen for everyone else.”

“Julie doesn’t do her volunteer work to be recognized, she’s been doing it quietly for years without any recognition,” Chambers added. “And I thought, wouldn’t it be nice for that woman to be recognized and I’m so grateful that it happened.”

Cochrane is described as “amazing and forward-thinking” by many who know her. She wanted to make a difference in Newmarket and considered running in the 2016 Ward 5 byelection. At the time, Chambers, too, expressed an interest in running.

“We decided we wanted to be a team, so Julie chose to be the campaign manager and I would be the candidate,” Chambers said of their foray into local politics. “Julie worked tirelessly and was amazingly committed and, at the heart of the issue for both of us, was the importance of the Clock Tower, and we really wanted to preserve our beautiful Main Street.”

A marketing professional by trade, Cochrane dissolved her firm, Creative House, after her diagnosis. That allowed her the opportunity to make new friendships and partnerships with Newmarket business owners, she said.

One of those collaborations included partnering with Newmarket’s RC Design to help create Community Living’s $5-million Happy Hearts campaign.

Cochrane is pleased to report that the organization is 85 per cent of the way to meeting its goal. It will also soon move into its newly renovated space near Mulock Drive and Bayview Avenue.

Jason Wighton, now president at the Newmarket Group of Artists, said Cochrane brought a “real passion, energy and focus to the group and has been instrumental in its growth.

"Julie used the resources and talents learned in her professional life for the benefit of the Newmarket visual art community,” Wighton said. “Julie’s organization, communication and marketing insights were instrumental in helping the organization grow from a small, grassroots organization to the premiere artist-run group in York Region that is it today. Julie’s bottomless reserve for bold new ideas and her relentless determination to make them a reality made her an ideal leader for the NGA."

These days, Cochrane spends the better part of her time in treatment at the Stronach Regional Cancer Centre at Southlake, about which she can’t say enough good things, she said.

“I didn’t know how important it would be to live within walking distance from the hospital because I can’t really drive anymore. It’s kind of interesting, but when I need to get a lift sometimes, I’ll just go outside and see which neighbour is home. It works out great,” she said.

Her latest volunteer project is about inclusion and she hopes to one day raise funds for a community group with the sale of T-shirts and flags that say: In this house we believe: Black lives matter; women’s rights are human rights; no human is illegal; science is real; water is life; in religious freedom; love is love and; kindness is everything.

Cochrane saw this message on a recent trip to San Francisco and said it speaks volumes to what she believes in and to what matters most to her.

But, in the meantime, the citizen of the year is focusing on her health.

“I’m fully committed to my healing and the community is helping me now,” she said. “Neighbours and friends take me to my appointments and they check in on my son when I’m doing treatment. I have no way of getting through this without accepting the help of the community.”

Here are all the winners of the Town of Newmarket’s volunteers of distinction. They were feted at an April 18 ceremony:

Citizen of the Year

Julie Cochrane

10-Year Volunteer Service Award

Heather Bunn

Rob Hums

Carol King

15-Year Volunteer Service Award

Cheryl Uhrig

Joy McWhirter

Brian Patry

25-Year Volunteer Service Award