'She was way ahead of her time'

Monday, June 6, 2016

by SUSAN MANN

Leslie Ballentine, a leading Canadian expert on special interest groups, particularly animal rights’ organizations, and a powerful communicator died May 29. She was 60.

Throughout her career, Leslie Ballentine served on a number of farm organizations. She was the communications manager for Egg Farmers of Ontario in the 1980s. In 1987, she became the founding executive director for the Ontario Farm Animal Council, splitting her time between the two farm organizations, notes Crystal Mackay, CEO of Farm and Food Care Canada.

The Ontario Farm Animal Council was the one of the first organizations if its kind in North America. The council was merged with another coalition, Agricultural Groups Concerned About Resources and the Environment, to form Farm and Food Care Ontario, which Mackay headed up after Ballentine left in 2004. Mackay was appointed CEO of Farm and Food Care Canada in January.

Ballentine became the farm animal council’s full-time executive director in 1989 and served until 2004, when she started her own communications company, Ballentine Communications Group. She also served as a volunteer for the Eastern Canadian Farm Writers Association.

Mackay says Ballentine was a “very unique lady because she was from the city and came to Guelph and got a degree in agriculture. She was way ahead of her time. She had a passion for agriculture but her roots were in the city.

She had a very unique lens on the need to bridge the gap between the two.”

Ballentine was also a trailblazer, who was instrumental with Ontario farm leaders in establishing Ontario’s farm animal council in the late 1980s. Many groups in the United States are calling the Farm and Food Care Ontario offices these days because “they’re just thinking of forming a farm animal council,” Mackay explains.

Ballentine was a pioneer who recognized the need for a coalition approach to deal with animal-specific matters. She worked “very long hours and dedicated a lot of her career and her life to trying to bring people together for a common purpose,” Mackay notes, adding she was hired by Ballentine.

“My first job out of university (from 1993 to 1998) was public events coordinator” for the farm animal council, Mackay says, noting Ballentine was her mentor.

Mackay says one of her enduring memories of Ballentine is she was an amazing writer and a person with a “good sense of humor.” She provided Mackay with many tips on how to handle various situations, particularly “what not to do.

Like a good coach, she could be really tough, which makes you better at your craft,” Mackay notes.

Ballentine is survived by her husband, Alan Beard, and daughter, Kailin Beard. BF