Presentation by Sean Markey of SFU's Centre for Sustainable Community Development at the June 24, 2013 annual general meeting of Skeena-Nass Centre for Innovation in Resource Economics (SNCIRE)

1. Investing in Place: Economic
Renewal in Northern British
Columbia
SNCIRE, June 2013

2. My Research in the NW
• New Economic Vision: 2003-2005
• Planning to Implementation: 2005-2006
• Industry Impact and Benefits: 2008-2012
• NEV II: 2009-2010
• Greg Halseth, Don Manson, Laura Ryser at
the Community Development Institute at
UNBC.

3. Outline
1. Rural BC in Context
2. Solutions in Community
3. Solutions in Region
4. Solutions in Industry

5. Exploring Place
Regional
Dev
Strategies
Corporate
Social
Responsibility
Strategies
Global
Industry
Strategies
Local/
Place
Government
Economic
Development
Strategies

6. Rural Assets

7. Rural Challenges

8. Cultural Complexity

9. BC in the 1950s

10. 1950s Solutions

11. 1950s – 70s Solutions

12. The Long Boom…

13. Problems of the Economic
Imperative

14. Space Economy
• Post-WWII Resource Boom
– Access to resources - “open the north”
– Connect producing areas to export points
– Significant (coordinated) infrastructure
investment
• Exploit Comparative Advantage
• Capital and community (uniform);
social relations stabilize industry

15. Space Restructuring
• Early 1980s recession
• Shift in Fordist compromise: flexibility
• Restructuring and population loss
• Continuation of resource wealth
extraction
• Severing of community linkages
• Removal of spatial commitment to
equity

16. And Then…?

19. One Slide History of Rural BC
The “Long Boom”:
1950s - 1981
“Restructuring”:
1982 – Present…

20. What the “Experts” Have to Say
• Restore land base certainty
• Additional community-based forest
tenures
• Private development of electricity
• Tourism development and linkages
• Marketing for rural products
• Invest in human capital
Policy Response:
- REDOs…
- RDOs…
- EDOs…

21. And the Rural Response…
“WE HAVE BEEN
STUDIED TO DEATH”

22. Resource Bank

23. Resource Bank

24. Bennett Dam

25. LNG

26. Withdrawals – But NO DEPOSITS!
Source: The Tyee

27. SOLUTIONS IN…
COMMUNITY

28. Defining “Place”
►Place-based development is a holistic
and targeted intervention that seeks to
reveal, utilize and enhance the unique
natural, physical, and/or human
capacity endowments present within a
particular location for the development
of the community or region...
►Thank you, academia…

29. Place = Home
• “We’re staying…”
• “At SNCIRE, we
love where we live.”

30. Old Skeena Bridge, Terrace
Photo: Karen Heisler

31. Place Economy
• Place Economy
– Shift from comparative to competitive
advantage
– Place-based policy/planning: Territorial
–Community and regional
development
–Integrated planning
• Challenge:
–Enabling vs. Abandonment Policy
Context
–Capacity variability

32. Beautiful BC…???
Source: Jeff Wall, 1990

33. Anywhereville,
BC

35. Northwest From Boom-Towns to
Sustainable Towns

36. Dawson Creek:
“Sustainable” Subdivision

37. Valemount: Traditional Assets

38. Valemount: New Assets of Place

39. Valemount: New School

40. SOLUTIONS IN…
REGION

41. What Factors Enable a Region to
Adjust and Adapt Over Time?
• Modern, productive infrastructure
• Skilled, innovative, entrepreneurial
workforce
• Supportive financial system
• Diversified economic base
• Civic capital
• Endowment of regional institutions to
chart new paths and relationships
forward

42. Required Regional Response
• Regional networking
• Research on impacts, business case for
investments
• United regional front – “size of the
prize”
• Consistent pressure: original agreement
(“they never thought we could do it”)
• Addressing internal disagreements

43. From “Cost” to “Investment”
• Four Key Infrastructures:
• Physical infrastructure
– ‘Old’ economy
– ‘New’ economy
• Human capacity infrastructure
– ‘next’ workforce (demographic, economic)
• Community capacity infrastructure
– ‘smart’ service provision
• Economic and business infrastructure
– Coordinate internally/externally

44. Fair Share Agreement
► $20 million x Rural industrial assessment base (previous tax year)
Rural industrial assessment base (2004)
►Chetwynd $1,633,645
►Dawson Creek $8,479,706 - 12,000 pop.
►Fort St. John $12,152,470 - 19,000 pop.
► Hudson’s Hope $582,493
►Pouce Coupe $666,906
►Taylor $535,304
►Tumbler Ridge $903,658
44

45. Benefits…
The recession allowed us to catch our breath, but
it didn’t really slow down much (Peace River
Business Representative).
What [the industrial tax base] does for regional
governance is it takes money out of the equation. And
when money is not part of the decision equation it makes
service decisions a lot easier. We talk about what the
services, what level of service you want to provide, how
you’re going to provide it, and then the last question is
how you’re going to pay for it. (Peace River Government
Representative).

46. Jurisdiction
Our biggest issue is that we are a product of the Province.
We get our authority through the Community Charter and
Municipal act – below six inches we have no authority, no
power, no say. It is frustrating for our elected official
because the local government only has authority to plan on
private land, but not crown land. The oil and gas sector
purchase subsurface rights – access across surface rights
to access this. We only have planning authority over private
lands and not crown or sub-surface, so as much as we
would like to plan for oil and gas, we have no jurisdiction.
(Peace River Government Representative).

47. Rapid Boom - Bust
You would like to think there is a master plan out there
for companies, but it is such a shot in the dark type
business. It is getting a little better, but it is still a shot in
the dark. There is no master plan out there, it is like an
amoeba, it just grows. It’s sorta weird, you would like to
think there is a plan, but there isn’t. (Peace River
Government Representative)

48. Fair Share Northwest???
• PRRD: 64,280 $35.3m (2012)
• Kitimat-Stikine: 39,200 $21.5m
• Bulkley-Nechako: 39,371 $21.6m
• Skeena-QC: 19,482 $10.7
• TOTAL: $53.8m
_______________

49. “We only have the
capacity to work with
the willing…”
BC Government Representative

50. SOLUTIONS IN…
INDUSTRY

51. Roots May Not Be in the Community

52. Separating Industry-Community
►Camp Versus Town Costs
►Restructuring in the Resource Sector
►Limitations of Resource Towns and
Worker Preferences
►Demographic dynamics
►Changes in Regulatory Environments
►Labour Supply
►Location of resources…

53. The Future of Rural???

54. Impacts…
The fly-in, fly-out thing brings lots of single
guys with too much money and not enough
recreation time. That has been a really big
push with all of the municipalities to monitor
the drug houses. For example, clearing out
derelict hotels that become drug
houses…The community is left to pay for
this – but they recognize that the problem is
then gone. (Peace River Government
Representative).

55. Corporate Social Responsibility

56. Implications: CSR
• CSR as neoliberal (non)policy response?
• Companies are selectively distributing
benefits to specific communities as strategic
business investments to secure support for
their projects, rather than distributing benefits
equitably to all impacted communities
throughout the region
• Jurisdictional confusion, frustration (First
Nation, municipal, regional, provincial,
federal)

57. Shared Wealth
• Advance CSR to fully reconceived
business model
• Investment Mentality:
– Transportation infrastructure
– Local training
– Productivity and quality of local businesses
– Long-term security of ecosystem integrity
• Driven by self-interest!

58. Key Messages
• You’re not alone
• Vision / Coordinated Policy / Investment
vs. Resource Bank
• Regional Collaboration is Everything
• CSR, social license is NOT Enough
• You have more power than you think
you do

59. Photo: BC Parks
LOVE THIS PLACE!!

60. Thank You
Sean Markey
Simon Fraser University
spmarkey@sfu.ca