Written by Alan Hustak for VMO
Wednesday, July 23rd, 2022

Bruno Mital, the former Chair of Dawson College’s Board of Governors spent a lifetime in community service holding positions as director general of Catholic Community Services, regional director for Kids Help Phone and field executive for Scouts Canada.

Before  joining CCS in 2009, he had spent 11 years at the telephone counseling service for troubled teens and three years as a field executive for Scouts Canada.

He organized the 90th anniversary jamboree at camp Tamaracouta in 2007. He was also a municipal recreation director for the Town of Saint-Jean-Baptiste de Rouville.

Expansive and upbeat, he left CCS a little more than a year ago when he was diagnosed with the pancreatic cancer that claimed his life. Even as he was undergoing treatment, he worked briefly as a fundraiser for McGill University.

John Walsh, former CCS board chair who first met Mital 15 years ago, described him as “a dynamic, enthusiastic young man who worked extremely hard, was dedicated and successful. He was an inquisitive man with a personality that just blew you away.”

Born in Montreal and raised in St. Basil le Grand on the south shore, Mital attended Macdonald Cartier High School where he was fondly known as “Six Pack,” and is remembered as a joker and class clown.

He took leadership training at Dawson College and then studied at Concordia University.

“He was Dawson, through and through, he graduated from the college in 1986 and served as board chair. Apart from making things fun, he got things done,” Donna Varrica told VMO.

“ He had incredible leadership qualities and organizational skills. He left an indelible mark with his productivity and with his respect for people.”

Mital was a motivational speaker who is being remembered by friends on his Facebook page as a “progressive, thoughtful man of many talents, positive, determined and passionate.”

An optimist to the end, he admitted on a posting two weeks before he died this week at the age of 49 that his odds of survival were slim. But he pointed out that he had lived longer than most people who are diagnosed with the terminal illness, saying “we need to support cancer survivors and their efforts in beating this disease, and show the world the incredible power behind a positive attitude”’
He leaves his wife Kelly Wilton and their son Max.

Click here to read Bruno's last Facebook post.