The fact that Powell River’s economy is picking up is not lost on its biggest advocate, mayor Dave Formosa.
Formosa and City of Powell River economic development manager Scott Randolph were the guest speakers at a Powell River Chamber of Commerce lunch meeting on Thursday, June 9.
Formosa took the opportunity to give the chamber an overview of the work being done to promote the community and to ask the chamber for its continued support.
“Retail is up. Land values are up. It’s not a fluke,” said Formosa at the meeting. “We have a plan and a vision. We have some good things going and it’s working.”
Forestry and mining have not been forgotten, said Formosa. They still play a role, but this town is moving toward new industries, such as land-based aquaculture, medical marijuana, international education and technology, he added.
While Formosa has been working on bringing new industries to town, there are still challenges in getting deals signed. Commerce moves slow on its own, and then mixing it with local government, it gets even slower, he said.
“You have to have the tenacity and the staying power,” said Formosa after the meeting. “When I built my company, that’s what it took. That’s what I’m doing here.”
City councillor Jim Palm is one of Formosa’s supporters. He has been on council with Formosa since 2008 when the mayor started in municipal politics as a councillor.
“No one realizes what the guy is about and how tirelessly he goes about his efforts,” said Palm. “Dave uses his connections so very well for this community. We’re in good hands here.”
Formosa said that even though only a few of the potential business ventures he presented at a media conference in October 2014 have come to fruition, such as Sino Bright and City Transfer’s lease of the mill barge terminal, it is too soon to discredit the opportunities.
“When you build great things, it takes a long time,” he said.
Formosa said a few business deals are close to being finalized, some are being worked on and some are being chased, but he said the groundwork has been laid to bring new economic activity to Powell River.
Councillor CaroleAnn Leishman, who also attended the chamber lunch, said she is hopeful about the economic strategies of council and the projects Formosa has been working on.
“The ideas sound very feasible and the mayor has made some strong connections and put multiple parties together to form collaborations,” said Leishman. “Just a couple more things need to come into place and we could have a few of those realized. It’s encouraging.”
Progress would not have been possible without the help of community partnerships with Tla’amin Nation, School District 47, Vancouver Island University and Powell River Regional Economic Development Society (PRREDS), before it became a department of city hall in March 2014.
“Things are happening because of a vision and the good work of a lot of people who are working in the same direction, and a little bit of luck,” said Formosa.
Groundwork that was laid by acquiring land from Catalyst Paper Corporation is another important part of the city’s economic development, said Formosa.
Formosa is in his second term as Powell River mayor and has spent the last seven and a half years in public office. From the start, Formosa has been focused on finding a way to reduce the dependency of the local economy and the city on the mill.
“I started this quest with the joint venture before I was city councillor, that was the big push for me was to help the community create some base that we could use to attract people,” he said.
Formosa, who had been working in economic development with Sliammon Development Corporation (SDC), in addition to owning Powell River area small businesses, said it was in 2008, when he heard there were plans to shut down the Powell River mill, that he decided to run for public office.
Born and raised in Powell River, Formosa said he had a glimpse of the effect the mill closing would have on the town.
“The news was pretty definite and scary,” he said. “It really motivated me to put together a team of people to run for council to see what we could do to see that the mill didn’t close.”
But even before that, Formosa was working toward attracting new business to town through his role at SDC, which has since been restructured into Tla’amin Capital Assets Corporation.
Formosa said the largest challenge to establishing other industries in Powell River has been the lack of land.
In 2006, PRSC Land Development Corporation was created as a joint partnership between the city’s Waterfront Development Corporation, Tla’amin’s SDC and Catalyst.
The joint venture was for 805 acres of mill land considered surplus. The deal gave Powell River and Tla’amin room to develop light industry and reduced Catalyst’s tax burden.
In 2011, Catalyst went into creditor protection and went through a restructuring. It was then that Powell River and Tla’amin bought Catalyst out of the partnership for $1.2 million. The mill forfeited its shares and the city made a deal with Catalyst for the mill’s barge terminal land, old administration building and surrounding property.
Formosa told the chamber on June 9 that, in addition to the Hummingbird Cove aquaculture farm near Saltery Bay Provincial Park, a seafood-processing firm is interested in 10 acres of land for a plant near the mill.
“Nothing is done,” he said, “until it’s done.”
