Dear Editor,
I would like to steer the attention of your readers to the Bella Coola Resource Society’s advertisement in your newspaper (May 2, 2019 issue). This letter is intended to expand on the information provided in the ad, which is meant to serve as part of a membership drive for the society, that might encourage and/or help the community sign up to be involved in this group.
The Bella Coola Community Forest Licence is held by the Bella Coola Resource Society. The only opportunity for someone to provide input on the direction of that Licence is to become a member of the Resource Society. It appears the membership has been kept to a minimum and largely made up of people who are involved with logging in one way or another. If we want to meet more needs in the community through the use of the Licence, the society’s membership must be diversified and expanded.
The Resource Society AGM coming up on June 26th will host an election for four out of the seven Board of Directors. Membership applications and nominations need to be submitted to the Board by June 19th. For more information, their contact is bellacoolavrs@gmail.com. These are the people responsible for the Community Forest:
Ken Dunsworth, up for election
Lily Pederson, up for election
Mark Nelson, up for election
Chris Matthews, up for election
Dan Bertrand, CCRD appointee
Dave Brown, stays 1 more year
Lonnie Kaechele, stays 1 more year
Who would you like to see in control of the Bella Coola Community Forest? Become a member, nominate someone (or more), show up to the AGM and vote for them.
We need all who care about the management of the forests to help develop an efficient and respectful process of gathering meaningful input from the people so we can move forward with this together.
Stutwiniitscw! Thank you!
Corissa McNeilly
Hagensborg, BC