Partner in BDO Chartered Accountants, Bill Cox, presented Gibsons council with his findings in the nearly completed Town audit at the regular council meeting April 21.
Cox said that he is expecting a clean audit, and with 99 per cent completed he doesn’t expect anything to change.
Cox went on to clarify a few of the misleading figures he had found. According to his findings, the Town of Gibsons has an accumulated surplus of $42 million. This number, Cox explained, includes the value of all assets of the Town.
“There actually is not a lot of surplus lying around,” he said. “I just want to drive home the point that accumulated surplus does not mean you have all that money to spend.”
Net debt is included in Cox’s report at a little over $4.5 million.
“What that means is that your total liabilities — things that you owe to others, like suppliers, debt to the MFA, all those things — exceed the assets that you have that are cashable,” Cox told council.
Having more debt than cashable assets (assets that can be sold off) sounds a little dire but isn’t uncommon for small community governments, Cox explained. Although it is something that the Town is going to need to work at slowly to bring its numbers back into the black, he said.
Tourism
Executive director of the Gibsons and District Chamber of Commerce Donna McMahon brought council good news for the tourist season this year.
Warm weather early in the season and a low Canadian dollar (0.82 USD) has already brought the first of what McMahon believes will be many vacationers to the Coast.
“Visitor numbers are up and I’m hearing that from merchants and accommodations,” McMahon said. “The mill’s annual refit is upon us. They expect that this year the number of visiting trades workers will exceed 1,000 during the first two weeks of May.”
She also introduced the first Business Walk for Gibsons, an event that has been gaining popularity in other nearby communities like Squamish, Vernon and Tofino.
Teams of two — in this case one from the Chamber and one from the Town — will go from business to business in Gibsons to get a sense of the successes, problems and solutions that local businesses have dealt with.
The Chamber is currently putting together a list of questions to ask local business owners.
All that jazz
The third delegate of the evening was Linda Williams with information regarding the 2015 Music in the Landing concert series and the Jazz Festival.
The Gibsons Jazz Festival (June 19 to 21) is going into its 20th year. It started in Dougall Park but was moved two years ago to Gibsons Landing due to people not knowing where Dougall Park is.
“Even people coming from Sechelt don’t know where Dougall Park is,” Williams said. “We talked to the businesses a few years ago … they were all for it, so we shut down the street and now it’s right in your face.”
Williams said moving the festival tripled their attendance.
Music in the Landing returns in June and will run weekends through to September at various locations around Gibsons.
Town says farewell
Ian Jacques, soon to be past editor of Coast Reporter, sat in on his last Gibsons council meeting where the Town recognized his contributions to the community on the Sunshine Coast over the last 11-plus years.
“I want to take this opportunity to personally thank Ian for his service to our community,” Mayor Wayne Rowe said. “I think it’s very difficult in a small community to be an editorial writer. People know where you are.”
Jacques reminisced about stories he had covered in his time on the Coast.
“Lots of highs, lots of lows, but at the end of the day I’ll remember all of the highs and all of the great people I’ve had the great fortune to interact with and get to know on both a personal and professional level.”
Jacques left Town Hall to applause.
