Rural Media, Kootenay Style

Rural media matters

Rural media matters. In the summer of 2018, Angela Long embarked on a 22,000-kilometre journey, traversing eight provinces and a territory – from Dawson City, Yukon, to Cape Breton, N.S. – to learn from residents, reporters and experts about journalism’s importance in rural communities. In the resultant series, she tells the stories of local news survivors and…

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Pilot Pairs Immigrants & Rural Communities

Pilot pairs immigrant workers and small towns

New federal immigration pilot is pairing remote northern cities with newcomers who need jobs An article by Clare Hennig, first published by CBC News on January 28, 2019   Some small rural communities in Northern B.C. facing a looming shortage of workers are hoping a new federal immigration program might help fill the employment gap. Right…

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Rural Coordination Centre Tackles Rural Health Issues

Rural Coordination Centre

Health care is a complicated business at the best of times. Effective, appropriate health care delivery in rural and remote places can be particularly challenging. Scattered populations, vast distances, sketchy infrastructure, and often unique socio-economic circumstances all contribute to making adequate health care for rural and First Nations citizens complicated. In rural British Columbia, the…

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Rural Health — Challenges & Innovations Webinar

Rural health matters

Rural health challenges in BC — what are they & what can we do to address them?   No rural issue is more pressing than the challenge of ensuring every British Columbian — no matter where she or he lives — has access to excellent healthcare. And no one in BC is more focussed on…

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Columbia Lake Tech Centre — the Podcast

As many rural communities struggle to reinvent their economies in the wake of wrenching change, the small BC town of Canal Flats has embraced new & emerging technologies as a means of establishing a new economic base for the town and surrounding East Kootenay region. In this BC Rural Centre podcast, Brian Fry, the co-founder…

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ABCDE, a la Peter Kenyon!

asset based community development with Peter Kenyon

“Shift the development mindset from needs and deficiencies to assets and capacities — from consumer, customer, and client, to co-producer, co-owner, and citizen.” Peter Kenyon   If your rural or remote community can use a boost, here are some primers, courtesy one of the world’s leading asset-based community development advocates, Australia’s Peter Kenyon.    …

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Small Towns Refuse to Die

Small towns fight back

Some small towns offer $1 lots, tax breaks and guaranteed loans to win over newcomers for a chance to prove they are islands of growth that matter to Canada’s future, says Joe O’Connor in this Financial Post article. Jay Patel decided about four years ago he wanted to buy a motel. He was living in…

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Investment Co-op Lets You Bank on Your Community

Investment co-op

Investment co-ops are coming to the Kootenays, as reported in this recent article by Claire Paradis, appearing in the December 13, 2018 edition of the Valley Voice.   If you’re putting your money into GICs, term deposits and other investments, you probably have little or no idea where your investment funds are going. Even though…

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Peter Kenyon to BC?

Asset based community development guru Peter Kenyon

Peter Kenyon, Australian-based founder of the Bank of I.D.E.A.S and renowned rural development leader, has made a lasting impression on scores of rural BC stakeholders over the past couple of years. BC Rural Centre Executive Director Gordon Borgstrom has announced Kenyon may be back in our neck of the woods soon. “It looks like Peter…

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