Business View Magazine | January 2020

338 BUSINESS VIEW MAGAZINE JANUARY 2020 well connected, digitally, in my specific region. The regional hospital is here, as well, and we have more PhDs per capita than any other region in the province. Having a Fortune 500 company like Tech Metals as our smelter - they require a high level of education and expertise, and they grow our economy in terms of a highly skilled workforce. “Metal Tech Alley took five years to get going and a lot of hard work and grant writing and funding requests. Along the way, we realized that all the business community had the same target market – looking for engineers, technicians, technologists, software developers. So, it made sense for them to pay our economic development office to market the region, rather than them doing it individually. In the last four years, we’ve raised $2 million – half from the private sector and half matched by the province – to drive and market the Metal Tech Alley branding initiative.” BVM: And what’s happening on the west side? Wetmore: “Community Futures Boundary is a regional organization that’s been in operation for 27 years and is responsible for economic development activities from Big White to Christina Lake – a broad geography with a population of around 12,000, spread out in a rural region. As far as highlights: This is an agricultural region and culture; local food production is the tie that pulls us all together. That’s apparent when you enter the Boundary region and we’re always looking at ways to better support that economic driver. “Our region, definitely, has affordable housing prices. And significant recreational facilities, including Big White ski hill at one end and Christina Lake at the other, which brings a huge amount of interest from the tourism sector to the region and provides a much-needed boost. We have a long mining history that comes and goes on a boom/bust cycle, but it is a part of the geography and economic piece of this region.