Oakville Town Hall Lights Up White for Invisible Disabilities Week

Oakville Town Hall is lit white on Monday evening, October 19, for Invisible Disabilities Week. The building on Trafalgar Road is one of 15 landmarks lighting up across Ontario, British Columbia and New Brunswick between October 18 and 21, and anyone is welcome to come by after dark, take a photo and share it with #InvisibleDisabilitiesWeek.

The reason for the lighting is the part that usually goes unsaid. Statistics Canada's 2022 Canadian Survey on Disability found 27 per cent of Canadians aged 15 and over, or 8.0 million people, live with at least one disability, and the most common types are pain, fatigue, chronic illness, mental health and learning disabilities. None of them show from across a room, which is why people who live with them get told they look fine, or get asked to prove it.

All 15 lightings were secured by one person. Lauren Pires, a Mississauga speaker and advocate, ran the campaign for a second year, adding British Columbia, three sites in London, Ontario, and the Peace Bridge in Fort Erie to the 12 landmarks she lined up in 2025.

Pires was born with Central Core Disease, a rare neuromuscular disorder that leaves her with about a third of the physical strength of the average person, and she hid it for more than 30 years. In 2023 she became the first Canadian to receive the Invisible Disabilities Association's "But You LOOK Good" Inspiration Award.

Oakville is a returning stop. Town Hall lit for this week in 2025 and again for her Rare Disease Day campaign in February, making Monday the third lighting here in twelve months. "When a city, a municipality or a bridge lights up for something, there is a form of approval and recognition behind it," Pires says. "That gives it a legitimacy beyond just a post online."