Community, Development

This Week: 2025 Rural Islands Economic Partnership Virtual Forum

The 2025 Rural Islands Economic Partnership (RIEP) Virtual Forum is coming up on Thursday, March 6 and Friday, March 7. Two of the organizers, Francine Carlin and Kate Maddigan are my guests today.

“ It’s going to be a jam packed two half days, 9:15 AM to 12:30 PM.  Our virtual events are really unique because we all live on islands or remote coastal communities and don’t have the opportunity to get together as a collaborative regional grouping. So it’s important to have these virtual events that bring together people from all across the coast and the islands, up from North Island as far as Alert Bay, to Sooke and beyond. So we have a pretty broad reach and this year it’s really important, particularly with the events in the world around economic  issues that relate to  our local  economic and social wellbeing,” explained Francine Carlin, Chair of the Rural Islands Economic Partnership. 

Ferry heading from Campbell River to Quadra Island – Roy L Hales photo

“Our theme this year is adaptation, innovation, and resilience, because in these times you need to be able to adapt to change. You need to be innovative in terms of what you are doing to keep small businesses vibrant and alive during these challenging times and to be resilient.  It’s an ongoing process to ensure that we have our sovereignty as a nation. And that we have our local communities and our local economies thriving as best they can.”

“The opening sessions will be looking at our economic snapshot in terms of what exactly and who exactly are we in terms of our population, our economy, our health and wellbeing. We’re going to follow up with a program around how we share our services and how we can leverage our economies of scale to be more resilient in times of change. Then moving into using  artificial intelligence” Is it a friend or an enemy? Or fremony? (laughter)  You have to find a way to use it so that it doesn’t overpower and that we can take advantage of the technologies that have been evolving for the last 30 years.”

Adam Olsen

 “Day two is looking at economic reconciliation. What is that all about in terms of how we’re going to work collaboratively and in concert with the Indigenous communities that live and work on these islands and across the remote coast. We’re having former MLA, Adam Olson, who is now the Chief Negotiator for the Tsartlip Nation.  One of the reasons that our Southern Gulf Islands got into the Island Coast Economic Trust and was able to apply for funds there was because of his advocacy with the province.  He’s going to be speaking to us about working together with Indigenous communities to ensure a diverse and integrated economy over time. The most difficult thing to pull together was what we’re calling this Learning Exchange. We’re bringing together about nine representatives of organizations from across the islands and the coast to share everything from housing initiatives and solutions to climate adaptation to food security and social enterprise.” 

Cortes Currents: What does RIEP do besides forums? 

Francine Carlin:   “We are an alliance of  local and regional organizations coming together around  ensuring that the voice of the islands and the coast is heard.” 

“In particular, we do  advocacy around housing. So we have nine housing groups speaking at the forum next week, talking about what they’re doing and how they’re leveraging their power to push the regional districts in the province to have a rural housing policy that  recognizes the special needs of the coast. It is difficult to get housing supplies and to get housing starts happening. The Cortes Island Housing Society  has done a lot of work around options for housing for rural communities from  purpose built homes to land shares, etc.”.

“RIEP is a connector and we’re a voice with governments. We have a reputation for bringing together voices that aren’t heard. We’ve met with the provinces, jobs, economic development and innovation  ministry,  or are meeting with them to talk about how they can be more supportive of the islands and the coast. We have a role to play in just connecting people. around shared  goals and resources.The same issues that face islands across the world face our islands in BC.”

“In fact, the  population of the islands in BC are equivalent to a small country. There’s 54,000 people living and working on these islands and along the coast. We’ve had issues around water, around healthcare, around transportation, all infrastructure issues that are faced by small islands around the world.”

“We reflect that as well. RIEP is put together to  empower  and be a voice for the needs of the rural and remote coast.” 

RIEP’s Board of Directors

Cortes Currents: RIEP’s governing body is a Board with 9 Directors, each of whom represents a different island. In addition to being the chair, Francine also represents Salt Spring Island. Kate Maddigan is the Director for Cortes. 

Kate Maddigan:  “Francine is just unstoppable.  She’s got so much energy and enthusiasm. She’s the one that spearheaded it too.  We’re just  so lucky that Francine continues to be an advocate for our rural islands and rural communities on the coast too.”

Francine Carlin: “That’s very kind of you, Kate. I couldn’t do it without you. One person can only walk by themselves for so long. Kate was at the first forum in 2019. I have a picture of her talking,  raising her hands and having a good old time saying, ‘what’s going on here?’ We’re lucky to have people like Kate  from  Cortes Community Economic Development Association (CCEDA), who brings together people from across Cortes. The Social Profit Network is really an engaging and vibrant organization.” 

Cortes Currents: There are also Directors representing Bowen, Cormorant, Gabriola, Galiano, Malcom and Pender Islands, as well another Director from the Strathcona Regional District. 

Francine Carlin: “ Marc Doll is on Quadra and active in the Quadra Foundation.”

“Quadra and Cortes have a lot of aligned resources and needs. RIEP highlights and brings together these silos that tend to operate on their own.” 

“As a result of the work of the two electoral area directors, Mark Vonesch for Cortes and Robin Mawhinney for Quadra, the Strathcona Regional district put together a resolution to call upon the province to do purpose built housing for the islands.  That was a big deal that happened in the fall. Now a resolution is a resolution, but the point is that there was nothing said before, and now it’s on the record. We can push for it.”

Cortes Currents: RIEP helped inform the public about local issues during the 2024 provincial election.

Francine Carlin:   Kate Maddigan and Marc Doll put together a questionnaire for the three  political parties and how they’re going to respond to the needs of the coast and the islands. It was a huge amount of work and  we got feedback from all three of the political parties and have a sense of where they are at and how we can push them around the issues that we’re facing in terms of our quest for a resilient and secure economic society for ourselves.” 

“Particularly with what’s going on in the States, we’re all worried and we don’t want to be rolled over by the bully.  So what we’re saying, you’re united to reform,  every voice counts and it’s important to be part of the resistance. That’s my philosophy. The voices of Canada are strong.”

One of the speakers: Aaron Cruikshank

Cortes Currents: Going back to this week’s Virtual Forum, will there be a recording of it? 

Francine Carlin:  “We’ll be able  to record the plenary sessions, not necessarily the breakouts. So the plenary, which will have the housing presentations from across the islands and the coast and the Learning Exchange, which will feature people from across the island talking about food security, tourism, economic resilience and social enterprise. They’ll be in a plenary and that will be recorded and available afterwards.” 

“But  what we’re known for is our breakout sessions, where people can come together and network. These gatherings are also about people getting together in these small groups, six to seven people in a virtual chat room and saying, what’s happening on your island? What’s happening in your remote community Port McNeil?  What’s going on there Sooke? You realize you have a lot of shared resources and a lot of shared ideas. People say, hey, well, we could learn from that and we could do this.”

Kate Maddigan:   “I’ve always been really inspired by the pioneering work that other islands are doing.  It just really helps me try and figure out creative ways to meet the challenges on our own Cortes Island.  It doesn’t make sense for us to  be isolated and trying to figure these things out on our own when Gabriola has figured out the community bus problem, Pender Island is starting up a community taxi service for transportation.  Cortes has done its own pioneering work with the hotel tax and other people have just been clamouring to learn more about that so they can replicate that on their own islands.  There’s just so many examples all over the place and to just really share those solutions with each other, this is where to do it.”

Francine Carlin: “On Salt Spring, there’s a Farmland Trust which has a program called Neighbors Feeding Neighbors. It’s a whole food security initiative. The work that Cortes Climate Action is doing is replicated, and on every island has a Climate Action and Adaption Program. The Gabriola Health and Wellness Collaborative is going to be speaking about their initiative to bring a health and wellness  program to Gabriola. There’s going to be  speakers  from the arts community from Galiano talking about their social benefit arts initiatives, bringing together children and adults for art learning and for expression.”  

“Regenerative tourism speakers from the Southern Gulf Islands Tourism Partnership, who successfully were able to get  the municipal regional district tax to support a pass through tax that would be returned to the community to help with housing and also to promote regenerative tourism. They’re going to be speaking about their three years and that initiative and how that’s been helping manage the boom and bust tourism economy.” 

“We’re having people from the Namgis Business Development Corporation, Alert Bay talking about their social enterprise called Grocers, where they’re pulling together the community to give back the food that’s produced there and to share it,  the way Salt Spring is doing.”


Portal to ‘Quickly Understand Doughnut Economics’ – courtesy reimagine Nanaimo

“The Vancouver Island Economic Alliance is going to be speaking about their initiative to have an island 2050 vision, which is about what the economies are going to be looking at.  Moving away from GNP to a more circular economy, a donut economics where you have more of a connection between people, planet, and profits.”

“The  artificial intelligence program is featuring the pioneers who have been working over the past 20 years in the area of artificial intelligence.  How it can be used for local benefit, so that you don’t have to be intimidated by the technology. Can you can use it to expedite and improve your work. So it can benefit as opposed to take away jobs and take away from the skills that people have. How can I post a question,  get an answer and then become more familiar with how to dig deeper into an issue. It’s like having a, an assistant. I look at it that way.”

“We can share these learnings and not constantly be reinventing the wheel.”

 Cortes Currents: Where would someone go to attend the forum? 

“Francine Carlin: We have our website, it’s  RIEP. ca, or you just look under Rural Islands Economic Forum, it comes right up.  You can see  all the information there that people need to know. We have a slogan about RIEP that says we are a: 

  • Network, which means the connections  
  • Advocate, which is stand up and stand for something, 
  • Support, which is what we’re doing with small businesses, helping them stay in tune with the digital economy, and
  • Act – It can’t be all talk, it has to be action.

“So it’s Network, Advocate, Support, and Act. We’re NASA, we’re taking off!”

 Cortes Currents: What do people have to pay to attend the forum?   

Francine Carlin: The regular rate is $40 a person. We just really welcome the people of Cortes and all your listeners  to check out reap.ca or the Rural Islands Economic Forum.

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