Halifax homicide: Library employee Lana Pinsky remembered for her literacy legacy

Lana Pinsky’s friends and co-workers at the North End Public Library are remembering her as a joyous soul and reflecting on the legacy she left behind. She was killed last month.

A ball of energy with a big smile.

That’s how former co-workers, turned longtime friends, describe Lana Pinsky.

“(A) little eccentric, loved to dance, you know? But was full of spirit,” Craig Smith says fondly, leaning forward on the couch in the Halifax North Memorial Public Library’s children’s section.

Smith has known Pinsky for decades. He, like many North Enders, grew up coming to the library often and began working there in Grade 11.

“There was that sense of family and sense of community and camaraderie that you don’t get in a whole lot of places, and so Lana was a part of that as well,” he says.

In the ’90s, Pinsky joined the library’s team as the reading support program co-ordinator, with big ideas about how to expand the program while engaging kids.

“When the program first started, it was the brainchild of the late Terry Symonds, who was the first youth worker here at the library. And one of the things Terry wanted to ensure was that tutors that came in would reflect the kids,” Smith says. “If the kids saw somebody they could emulate and hopefully somebody that we see in university, they’d say ‘university is a possibility for me,’ and so Lana carried that on.”

All those who knew Pinsky say her impact on North End children’s literacy will never be forgotten.