Bowen Island’s Cultural Master Plan not only needs a new coat of paint, but also a modern update.
That’s the message the Bowen Island Arts Council brought to council in a presentation at its Monday night meeting. Council gave the green light for a $5,000 request, including in-kind contributions, from the municipality and the ability to lead a review and revision of the Cultural Master Plan.
“We were one of the first communities that actually put together a Cultural Master Plan,” said Jacqueline Massey, executive director of the arts council before the meeting. “Since then, across the country a lot of cities have them. Whistler just completed theirs a little while ago.”
The plan is more than 11 years old after being originally written in 2003 and implemented in 2005. As an official municipal bylaw, its guidelines helped shape the direction and tone of the culture and arts on the island.
“It’s a policy around arts and culture and how that meshes with the municipality,” Massey explained. “It was a huge community, collaborative and very inclusive process involving a steering committee of 20 people and numerous consultation meetings with groups from a broad spectrum of our community.”
The plan was broken down into four major themes, including a framework for advocacy and support, arts and cultural facilities, community economic development and cultural education programming and support.
“As a result of that, we work quite closely with the municipality in developing our programs and services, so over the years a number of these recommendations happened,” she said.
However, the one directive that has been left behind is having a new facility dedicated to art and culture, Massey noted.
“The biggest area we haven’t had much success for is under the arts and cultural facilities, which is a huge need in the community and unfortunately that agenda has not really been forwarded much for a whole bunch of reasons,” she said.
The arts council has advocated for a multi-purpose space for the performing arts, Massey noted.
“We do have community lands that are owned by the municipality, so there’s work being done in trying to explore what could be possible,” she said. “We’ll probably continue to play a big role in that.”
The new, updated master plan for arts and culture is expected to take one year or up to 18 months to complete.
According to the arts council, the new framework will articulate a vision and model of what a vibrant and economically viable arts and culture component will look like in the local economy, feasible recommendations and provide measures for implementation.
“We’re really excited about that potential, too, that economic development,” Massey said. “I’m sure that will be a big component to the cultural master plan.”
The master plan includes strengthening and supporting the arts scene to help drive tourism to the island, Massey said.
“We are … the fifth most artistic community in Canada,” she added. “We have a lot of local resources in terms of talent and creativity to draw from. We already have that infrastructure to build on.”
