Bestwick Joins Junior B Nanaimo Buccaneers As President, GM & Coach
MARK MACDONALD
NANAIMO – The NPC has Snuneymuxw First Nation, Nanaimo Port Authority, Nanaimo Airport Commission, Vancouver Island University, the Greater Nanaimo Chamber of Commerce and the City involved in the partnership. The NPC was incorporated in January, 2022.
Bill Bestwick is back in the Nanaimo junior hockey scene. Nanaimo Buccaneers owner Nicole Brandenburg has announced that Bill has joined the Vancouver Island Junior Hockey League team as their new President, General Manager and Head Coach. “Bill brings an extensive amount of experience in the day to day operations of a Junior Hockey Team,” says Nicole. “His hockey accomplishments in junior Hockey in the BC Hockey League are well documented and we are excited to have him on board.”
Bill played on the original Nanaimo Junior B team and was an original member of the Nanaimo Clippers and earned a hockey scholarship to St. Louis University. He was the longest serving and most successful coach of the Clippers and led the team to two BCHL championships, including one appearance in the national Royal Bank Cup (now Centennial Cup) championship.
Colin Stansfield
Nanaimo Prosperity Corporation, the City of Nanaimo’s new economic development organization, has hired Colin Stansfield as its first Chief Executive Officer, Board chair Richard Horbachewski has announced. Since 2019, Stansfield has been the Executive Director of the Sunshine Coast Region Economic Development Corporation.
IWCD continues its torrid pace on building commercial and industrial projects on Vancouver Island, as their latest project, Building 2 at the McCallum Light Industrial project is now complete in Langford. The building is 69,250 square feet and is the largest of the three buildings in the project, featuring top-floor office space with a light industrial warehouse.
Congratulations to Rick Horsland and his Horsland Real Estate Group for becoming the number one individual realtor at RE/MAX of Nanaimo for 2023. Owner Charlie Parker presented the award to Rick, who also ranked in the top 100 RE/MAX Realtor list for Western Canada, out of a total of 4,567 agents.
Congratulations to the Alvin Tan Group for being one of the top 10 teams in British Columbia for eXP Realty in January. Alvin’s office is at 25 Cavan Street in downtown Nanaimo.
Bill Bestwick
460 Realty announced their top 10 salespeople for 2023. They are: Cody Dreger, Brendan Wilkinson, Josh Statham, Phil Gonyer, Dustin Layzell, Kristina Fedorak, Lynne Wilson, Brooke Haxton, Parker McDonald and Jenna Woods.
Katy Lepine tells us that Coastal Community Credit Union is planning on making significant renovations to its Courtenay branch later this year. It’s more good news from CCCU, which also announced merger plans with BlueShore Financial, which would create one of the largest credit unions in B.C., with 118,000 members, 36 branches, over 800 employees and close to $12 billion in assets under their administration.
Tourism Nanaimo’s Visitor’s Centre has a new home – at the Vancouver Island Conference Centre on Commercial Street. Tourism Nanaimo opened at its new location March 12, after it announced it was closing its office at Northfield Road and the Nanaimo Parkway.
A five-storey multi-family residential complex containing 31 micro studio rental units at 337 Robson Street in the Old City Quarter has been approved by Nanaimo city council. The units are reportedly 365 square feet and will be built with wood-frame construction.
How do they do it? Congratulations are in order for the District of Lantzville, who have managed to pass a zero-percent tax increase again this year – the second year in a row they’ve done so. Taxpayers are undoubtedly hoping other municipalities and cities will take their lead and do the same. . .
The Greater Nanaimo Chamber of Commerce is bringing back its Business Expo to the Vancouver Island Conference Centre on Thursday, March 28 from 12 noon to 5 p.m. It’s a free event to attend, and it includes booths for companies to share their products with the public.
Western Forest Products has added a new lumber drying machine to their Saltair Sawmill, following recent announcements of adding two more continuous dry kilns at their Nanaimo Duke Point and Chemainus operations. Together, the investments total roughly $47.5 million.
The GAIN Group held the official ground-breaking for its first-ever Porsche dealership in Nanaimo, alongside the Island Highway at Wills Road, across from Harbourview Volkswagen. SupErb Construction is the general contractor for the project.
The city has granted a development permit for Vancouver Island University to build a 10-storey student housing building on their Nanaimo campus. VIU President Deborah Saucier has said they have a 300 person waiting list for student housing. They are hoping the project will complete by September, 2025.
Harbour Air is expanding its routes again. The floatplane service provider has re-introduced twice-daily flights from Comox harbour to Vancouver, and Jessica Dunn made a recent presentation to the District of Ucluelet to announce the company is hoping to start service in and out of Ucluelet from the town’s public dock as soon as this summer.
Speaking of expanding transportation, Wilson’s Group of Companies is bringing back its popular Tofino Bus, with the first runs starting March 29. It will be in their full-sized motor coaches and will run through the spring and summer.
BC Ferries notes that it will receive four new fully electrical passenger car ferries from Royal Van der Leun’s Victoria branch in the near future. The ferries are scheduled to begin operations by 2027, and each ferry will be able to carry up to 47 vehicles and 390 passengers. They will run on routes from Nanaimo to Gabriola Island, and from Campbell River to Quadra Island.
Mark MacDonald is President of Communication Ink Media & Public Relations Ltd. mark@communicationink.ca