Former Esquimalt councillor Ruth Layne, a community activist, fundraiser and founding director of what is now the Crystal Meth Prevention Society of B.C. has died at age 54.
Layne developed pneumonia following surgery for a life-threatening condition unrelated to the catastrophic stroke that felled her on Jan. 6, 2008. The stroke left her with locked-in-syndrome -- her mind intact but every voluntary muscle paralyzed except eye movement.
She died on July 22.
Ironically, Layne once led a major fundraising campaign for teenager Nicholas Chow, who was left profoundly disabled after a gang-style beating in Esquimalt in 2001. Even though she was incapacitated, through her husband and mother, Layne fought to raise awareness for locked-in syndrome. She also fought for its victims, trying to help them to regain as much of their competence as possible, an effort that was chronicled in the Times 91原创 on the second anniversary of her stroke.
"We're all devastated," said Layne's mother, Marilyn Wright, who said her daughter knew the risks and chose to undergo the surgery.
"She was a dynamo," Wright said. "Her presence, when she came in a room, was like 'boom.' " She loved to laugh, to be with people and to help them however she could, she said.
Layne was a classic first-born child. Sometimes when she went out to play, "the kids in the neighbourhood almost scattered when they saw her because she always wanted to play school and she always had to be the teacher," Wright said, laughing.
Layne is the mother of two adult children, Sarah and Adam.
"She had a great passion for youth and a great desire to try and stem the harms in our environment," said Mark McLaughlin, program director of the Crystal Meth Prevention Society of B.C.
She took up the fight for more detox treatment after a 20-year-old friend addicted to meth committed suicide. No treatment was available because he was over 18.
Layne has left two huge legacies, he said. The first is helping to get warnings about meth in front of 55,000 students -- and the second is a six-bed detox rehab centre in Vic West for meth and other drug-involved youth.
She was more than a marketing employee at Abstract Developments before her stroke, said owner Mike Miller, who was at her bedside hours before she died.
"Ruth was relentless when it came to solving things," he said, but also "cared for everyone else in the company immensely."
On her own time, she bonded with his three-year-old daughter, taking her shopping and to the park.
Just days before her stroke, Miller's family was holidaying in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico, when his infant son became ill and nearly died over New Year's. No flights back to Victoria were available but Layne "turned the world upside down" getting them back home, where his son recovered.
A so-called "navy brat" born in Victoria, Layne embarked on her political career in the mid-1990s when she mobilized her neighbourhood to petition for speed bumps. She won a council seat in 2002.
She stood up for Esquimalt, against using it as a dumping ground for Greater Victoria, and extended her compassion to those who were victimized, said Andrew J. Watson, Layne's husband of 19 years.
"Ruth was always a do-er. There a time for talk and a time for action and Ruth would take the latter."
In 2005, she campaigned unsuccessfully for the mayor's chair, hoping to "take partisan politics off the table," but she had more than one public spat with incumbent Darwin Robinson.
No one had to wonder where Layne was coming from in her stances, said Esquimalt Coun. Don Linge, who knew her for 20 years. "She was outspoken, flamboyant and feisty.
"She was always very clear in bringing what she felt was in the best interests of the community to the table," Linge said, although she was not always on the majority side.
"She never, ever lost sight of her love of the community ... not only on council but just as an individual. She was always that way."
