The City of Meadow Lake is considering a new partnership that could mean big things for the future of local business. During the regular meeting of Meadow Lake city council held Monday evening (Jan. 13), Cliff McKay, executive director of the Beaver River Community Futures Development Corporation (BRCFDC) made a presentation, explaining what his organization is all about and offering the city a membership invitation. “BRCFDC is a not-for-profit corporation that has provided business developmental financing, advice and support services to individuals and businesses in our region, of which your community is a part of, since 1990,” McKay explained. “While we believe, in the past, we have been accountable to our regional stakeholder communities, our board of directors wishes to formalize that accountability further. We wish to accomplish this through the development of a new membership structure, which has been approved at our annual meeting held in August. At this time, we are inviting the city to become a member of BRCFDC.”

Class ‘A’ local government membership is open to any town, village, resort village, city, northern town, northern village, northern hamlet, northern settlement, rural municipality or First Nations government that pay any prescribed fees. Currently there is no prescribed fee, and, as a member, the city’s rights, privileges, restrictions and conditions would include: entitlement to one vote at all membership meetings except at membership meetings where another class of membership is entitled to vote separately as a class; receipt of audited financial statements from the corporation each year; representation at meetings of the members of the corporation by any individual authorized by a proxy; and entitlement to vote to elect directors to the board. As McKay noted, BRCFDC assists small town and rural businesses in northwest Saskatchewan start, expand and grow.

The Beaver River Community Futures Corporation was established in 1988, and the Beaver River Business Development Corporation in 1989. In 1994, these two corporations merged into what is now BRCFDC. Today, the organization serves 46 communities in northwest Saskatchewan, an area covering 120,000 square kilometres. Its core funding, investment capital and special funds are provided by the federal government through Prairies Economic Development Canada. This support is part of the Government of Canada’s commitment to Community Futures Development Corporations in Saskatchewan. “Our services will continue to be available to your community regardless of whether you accept this invitation to membership,” McKay added.

Following McKay’s presentation, he opened the floor to questions from city council. “If we, as a council, decide this is something we should be involved in and, if we do have someone interested in representing us on the board, it wouldn’t necessarily have to be a council member?” asked mayor Merlin Seymour. McKay said this is correct, adding it could be anyone the city appoints as its representative. “This is something that could help with economic development throughout the city,” Seymour continued. “It could help get people steered in the right direction when they want to start a business or improve on their existing business.” McKay agreed.

“We’re a strong community with Métis and Indigenous, and all the stuff that’s been behind there, but there’s lots of money in both of those areas where they will pay for the majority of a business plan put together which can really boost the economy,” he said. Councillor Marty Bishop, meanwhile, asked if the city’s role as a member would simply be that of a liaison between the pubic and BRCFDC. “That’s the way I look at it,” McKay replied. “We want to make sure we are responsible to all the communities we serve.”