A new chair of Northern Development Initiative Trust has been elected.
Vanderhoof Mayor Gerry Thiessen will take over for former chair Evan Saugstad, who was been with NDIT since its inception in 2004. Thiessen explains how his predecessor helped prepare him for this opportunity.
“His ability to be calm and make good decisions and that was really encouraging to me,” he says.
“He did a lot to help the Trust and now we as communities and me as the Chair are the benefits of that.”
Thiessen took the ballot 10-3 over Fort St. John Mayor Lori Ackerman. The term goes year-by-year.
It’s going to be a long-term process to accomplish what Thiessen wants to do, as he explains.
“My plan is to be in touch with our Board of Directors and then talk to our staff, then sit down to develop programs that meet the needs of our communities across the north.”
The trust invested $14 million in 458 projects across Northern BC and $2.6 million in third-party projects in 2017. Of those, 11% of the approved projects involved First Nations.