Kootenay Business magazine was pleased to sponsor the Creative Professional Excellence Award. 

Congratulations to the winners in all 12 categories:

• Entrepreneur of the Year Award: Go Fetch—Dallas Vannancourt
• Business of the Year Award: Sullivan Pub—Kent Lees
• Community Boost Award: Grubstake Pizza—Carly Marsh
• Tradeperson/Contractor of the Year Award: Bob and Mike Kitt
• Environmental Stewardship Award: Green Earth Recycling—Katie Tersmette
• Tourism Excellence Award: Kimberley Alpine Resort—Ted Funston
• Professional Services Excellence Award: Rockies Law—Steve Brine
• Retail Business of the Year Award: Back Door Gifts—Tanya Tasmasi
• Creative Professional Excellence Award: Story & Co—Matt Thompson
• Employee of the Year Award: Bernice Foreman—Falkins Insurance
• Food and Beverage Industry Award: Kinbari Sushi—Andrew Luu
• Youth Friendly Business Award: Subway—Laura Cyra-Korsgaard

Continuing Education co-ordinator Danette Polzin said, “Our online business courses keep expanding and it seems we have something new to offer in every guide. These include advanced website strategies, business coaching certificate, business research certificate, media buying strategies, recruiting and retaining Gen X and Gen Y, and a supervisory and leadership certificate. We also continue to offer the popular social media and e-marketing courses. Most of these are available online and fit an entrepreneur’s busy schedule.”

More cooking classes with Chef Jaime Gordon are scheduled, for both Cranbrook and Kimberley, such as making sushi and Vietnamese, Greek and Mexican cuisine. Chef Steven Lechmann has joined the team in Cranbrook and is offering barbecue techniques and cooking for bachelors. The Cranbrook cooking classes have a unique feature as they are offered in the professional cook training classroom.

Summer camps and building workshops are back at Kimberley. A variety of kids camps are available for all interests and ages and the ever-popular Introduction to Timber Framing and Straw Bale Building programs start in July. New to Kimberley is a five-day Introduction to Western Horsemanship and Horse Safety class. Discover the art and science of working with horses.

Not all classes take place in a classroom. Adventures in Geocaching gets you outside looking for caches. Consider it a high-tech, treasure hunting game using GPS-enabled devices. It’s fun, active and the whole family can get involved.

A growing area of interest to new parents is baby sign language. Experienced sign language instructor Mary Hennig teaches parents how to sign to their baby. Grandparents are welcome too.

“We also offer regular, ongoing industry certification courses including WorkSafeBC, Canadian Red Cross and St. John Ambulance first aid and FoodSafe,” Polzin added, “Along with fun classes like acrylic painting and Zentangle."

Be sure to check out our new guide when it arrives in your mail box or go to: www.cotr.bc.ca/ConEd

The primary asset held by Gravitas is the option to earn an 80 per cent interest in the Sully group of claims, located near Fort Steele in southeastern British Columbia.

About the Sully property

The Sully property comprises 1375 hectares located 27 kilometres east of Kimberley, B.C., and overlies rocks of similar age and origin as those which host the world-class Sullivan Deposit, owned by Teck Corporation.

Sullivan was discovered in 1892 and is known to be one of the largest sedimentary-exhalative (sedex) deposits in the world.

Over its 100-year lifetime, Sullivan produced approximately 150 million tonnes of ore, including three billion ounces of silver, eight million tonnes of zinc and eight million tonnes of lead, collectively worth over $45 billion at current metal prices.

The parties caution that past results or discoveries on proximate land are not necessarily indicative of the results that may be achieved on the Sully property.

In 2010 and 2011, Gravitas completed an extensive surface geophysical program, outlining a prominent gravity anomaly with dimensions of approximately three kilometres by one kilometre, at an interpreted depth of up to approximately 1000 metres. This geophysical feature is located seven kilometres south of the Kootenay King Deposit, a past producer that contained mineralization of similar tenor and mode of occurrence as Sullivan.

Permits for the proposed drill program are in hand, with drilling activity expected to commence immediately.

Appointed to the College Board by the Province effective December 1, 2011 for a term ending July 31, 2013 is Gloria Perry of Fernie.

Ms. Perry is owner and president of Alpine Lumber in Sparwood which she and her husband John have run since 1985.  She is also Corporate Secretary for Fernie Lumber. Before moving to British Columbia she worked with the Royal Bank of Canada in Barrie, Ontario. Active in her community Ms. Perry sat on the board of the Elk Valley Blazers senior men’s hockey team for seven years, and then on the Fernie Ghost Riders Junior B Hockey Team for a decade.

“I’m very pleased to welcome Gloria to the College Board,” said Dr. Nick Rubidge, president and CEO. “Her strong professional background and volunteerism will service us well in the years ahead. I look forward to working with her.”

Ms. Perry joins previously appointed board members Chair Orest Federko, Vice Chair Richard Reinders, Alex Jensen, Joe Pierre, Rob Ondrik, David Handy, Jim Abbott and Doris Penner; COTR elected faculty representative Grant Unger; COTR elected support staff representative Colin Martyniuk; COTR elected student representatives David Wiebe and Katie Hamar; and COTR Education Council Chair Jim Bailey.

"We are very excited to be putting funds in the hands of communities to benefit youth in their specific regions," said Wayne Lundeberg, CBT, director, Youth Initiatives. "These first communities demonstrated a readiness to come together in a collaborative manner to set priorities, address issues in their regions and enhance activities and services for their youth."

Six pilot communities and their surrounding areas that will begin the program this winter are: Revelstoke, Golden, New Denver/Silverton, Salmo/Ymir, Crawford Bay/Riondel, and Montrose/Fruitvale/Beaver Valley.

"Our community is incredibly excited by the opportunity to enhance our youth services," said Daniel Seguin, Crawford Bay and Riondel area. "We look forward to working together and with CBT, to find the common ground on which consensus can be built as to where to direct the funding. It's definitely an inspiring time on the east shore."

The program is intended to bring added value and provide resources to communities that show the desire and ability to work together to identify and address issues in their youth communities.

"Both youth and adults in the community have been talking about addressing the gaps in the youth services and opportunities for years," said Monica De, Golden and area. "Since CDYF became available, there is finally a flexible funding opportunity to help address the needs of youth in Basin communities."

Another four communities who submitted successful Expressions of Interest will begin the program in the spring of 2012. They are: Nelson/Harrop/Proctor, Trail/Warfield, Rossland and Kimberley.

The next deadlines for Expression of Interests from communities are March 16 and October 31, 2012. Guidelines and applications are available at www.cbt.org/youth. For more information please call Wayne Lundeberg at 250-304-1625 or email cdyf@cbt.org with "subscribe to CDYF info" in the subject line to receive program updates.

CBT works with youth and communities to increase youth opportunities and engagement through enhancing capacity, leadership and participation. In addition to this new program, CBT also funds youth developed projects through the Columbia Basin Youth Grants program and provides a forum for youth in the Columbia Basin to share their art, ideas and experiences with each other through Scratch magazine and www.scratchonline.ca.