NEWS
February 15, 2019
Abbotsford has been named a Global Top7 Intelligent Community, 2019
We hope our support with your Economic Development Strategy and Innovation Forums contributed to this impressive honor:
October 22, 2018
EcoPlan’s work with the Cowichan Valley Regional District (CVRD) has recently been recognized by UBCM’s Excellence in Governance awards. Receiving an honourable mention in the governance category, the Cowichan 2050 Regional Collaboration Framework is a leading-edge statutory policy tool and collaborative approach to regional planning and decision-making. Emphasizing regional collaboration, communication, and coordination, its purpose is to address the crosscutting nature of emergent challenges faced by local governments, such as those related to climate change and population growth.
COMPREHENSIVE COMMUNITY PLANNING TOOLKIT: FINDING BIMADIZOWIN WINS NATIONAL AWARD
June 7, 2018
Last week, the Canadian Institute of Planners announced its 2018 award winners and EcoPlan’s work with the Nishnawbe Aski Development Fund (NADF) and the CCP Advisory Committee on the Comprehensive Community Planning Toolkit: Finding Bimadizowin has won an award! The CCP Toolkit, which is a guide and kit of resources to support better planning in Indigenous communities and key stakeholders in First Nations communities, has won the Award for Planning Excellence for Planning Publications.
EcoPlan provided support for a historic agreement between the District of Lillooet, P’egp’íg’lha Council (T’ít’q’et) and the Squamish-Lillooet Regional District, signed on May 24, 2018. Over the past year, EcoPlan worked with the Intergovernmental Relations Working Group, a group composed of elected officials and staff from the District of Lillooet, Lillooet Tribal Council, P’egp’íg’lha Council, Sekw’el’wás, SLRD, and Tsal’álh, as they collaboratively drafted a Protocol Agreement for Communication and Cooperation.
WILLIAM TROUSDALE WORK IN SUSTAINABLE TOURISM INSIGHTFUL OVER DECADES
William Trousdale’s work on sustainable tourism in the popular island of Boracay, Philippines is still proving relevant, as referenced on Filipino news site Inquirer.net.
WILLIAM TROUSDALE AT UPCOMING TRIBAL NATURAL RESOURCE DAMAGES ASSESSMENTS
William Trousdale has been asked to speak at the upcoming Tribal Natural Resource Damages Assessments seminar, December 4, in Seattle. The title of the talk is: Structured Decision Support: Restoration Scaling of Lost Native American Cultural Services under NRDAR.
AWARDS ARE THE CANDLES ON THE ICING ON THE CAKE
Here are EcoPlan, getting to work on fun, challenging projects is what keeps us excited to get to work in the morning. But we’ve often commented that the ‘icing’ on the cake is the ongoing relationships with past clients, and seeing plans come to life through actions.
CULTURE: ADAPTATION AND TRANSLATION – A LOOK AT STORIES AND ANALYSIS
Last month, William Trousdale gave a talk at the Museum of Vancouver as part of their “Built City” Series. The talk explored the challenge of translating sacred stories, cultural stories, and everyday stories into frameworks that can be analyzed and understood across cultures.
This week, the Vancouver Sun has a five-part series of First Nations economic development. The series profiles five BC First Nations and the various ways that they are gaining economic independence. From run of river power, to gas stations, logging companies, campgrounds plans for large resorts.
The Planning Institute of British Columbia (PIBC) just announced their 2015 Awards for Excellence in Planning Practice, and EcoPlan has been recognized for an silver award in the category of Research and New Directions in Planning for Planning for Climate Change: A Values-based, Strategic Approach for Urban Planners.
CAREFUL WHAT YOU WISH FOR: “MALCOLM ISLAND WINS NATIONAL PLANNING AWARD!”
This is pretty exciting. While working on an economic development plan with Malcolm Island in 2014, we did a visioning activity in which we asked community members the following question: “Malcolm Island’s Economic Turnaround Wins National Planning Award. How did they do it?”
Recently, William appeared in the community events section of the Sun.Star Bacolod, a local newspaper from the Negro Occidentale region of the Philippines. He had just finished facilitating a two-day workshop on Local Economic Development (LED) in Silay City, a project funded by UN-Habitat. Here he is in action.
This recent article in Plan Canada magazine describes some interesting work we did with the Regional District of North Okanagan (RDNO). Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) often ‘falls off the rails’ when a plan is being implemented, perhaps because it is too complex, people are too busy, or other factors.
EcoPlan recently worked with UN-Habitat and Compass Resource Management to produce the planning guide “Planning for Climate Change: A strategic, values-based approach for urban planners”. It’s a book and a series of tools that planners in cities of all stripes.
“The early work the Canadian Urban Institute did with you on economic development in the Philippines, including the manual testing, made an early contribution to the country’s local economic development framework that has emerged over the past few years and is now promoting an explosion of collaboration between local governments and their private sector.
STRATEGIC PLANNING – STEP BY STEP (5 OF 5)
We were approached by the Council for the Advancement of Native Development Officers (Cando) to write a quarterly article on the strategic planning process for their newsletter – ‘N-Side’. Cando is a great organization that provides support and capacity building for Economic Development Officers in First Nations communities.