The Nechako-Kitamaat Development Fund Society board has recently approved $100,000 in funding to assist with resurfacing Baker Airport's runway in Burns Lake.
“Investments in runway upgrades provide significant opportunities that contribute to the betterment of our communities by creating jobs and strengthening local economies,” said Shirley Bond, Minister of Jobs, Tourism and Skills Training and Minister Responsible for Labour.
On Feb. 27, 2016, Lakes District residents voted in a referendum to approve raising their taxes to resurface the airport's runway. However, the Lakes District Airport Society (LDAS) is still dealing with a $258,000 shortfall to complete the project.
In order to address the $258,000 shortfall, LDAS has applied for a number of grants and has distributed a funding drive letter to a number of businesses, organizations and First Nations bands asking for funding to complete the project.
Lakes District News has contacted LDAS and the Regional District of Bulkley-Nechako (RDBN) for several weeks to find out how much funding they have secured to address the shortfall. However, they have not responded.
As of April 4, 2016, LDAS had secured $30,000 of the shortfall.
Last month, TransCanada's Coastal GasLink Pipeline Project contributed another $30,000 towards Baker Airport's resurfacing project.
The runway resurfacing project is quoted at $1.55 million. The RDBN had originally planned to borrow $1 million to be repaid over 15 years. However, the province implemented a new policy interpretation which no longer allowed local governments to borrow for more than five years for assets they do not own.
Since the RDBN does not own the airport, they were then limited to a five-year debt. To accommodate this, the RDBN would've had to increase the tax limit of residents even more than originally planned.
"The elected officials did not want to increase [taxation] more than the original referendum plan," explained Corrine Swenson, Manager of Regional Economic Development for the RDBN, last March. "We planned to make up the shortfall with grants and donations."
Reg Blackwell, LDAS president, told Lakes District News earlier this year that not resurfacing the runway could result in the closure of the airport. He explained that although the current condition of the runway is safe, large pieces of asphalt have been cracking away from the main runway.
The Nechako-Kitamaat Development Fund Society board has also contributed $4700 toward the Burns Lake Rotary Club's cemetery upgrade project. This funding will assist with restoring and promoting two famous historical people buried in the Burns Lake Cemetery. The Nechako-Kitamaat Development Fund Society was jointly established in 1997 with a combined contribution of $15 million by the government of British Columbia and the former Alcan Inc., now Rio Tinto. The fund’s investment area includes lands impacted by the original Kemano project and focuses on the communities in the Ootsa, Lakes, Nechako and Haisla regions of the north.