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The year the tough got going

Anyone hoping for a positive depiction of 2009 would be hard-pressed to find a resident willing to comply.

It was a tough year, but difficult times also provide an opportunity to show creativity and resilience, and this is where Squamish shone in 2009.

There's no doubt that 2009 will go down in the annals as the year of the downturn in the economy.

In Squamish, that nail-biting situation caused significant job loss as developers pulled up stakes and provincial cut backs seriously wounded local organizations, programs and employment. The cut backs left addictions outreach workers, the library and the School District, among others, scrambling.

This was also the year Marina Estates residents, unable to pay off the bill to renovate their leaky condo, faced the loss of their homes.

Locals also felt stung as VANOC decisions left some believing Squamish would be excluded from Games time benefits while being forced to endure untold inconvenience and loss of business.

And with the final push for highway completion, many residents finally lost patience completely with the duration and impact of road construction.

Finally, Fire Rescue experienced arguably its most difficult year ever beginning with a widely panned decision to lay off a staff member, then dealing with several three alarm fires resulting in the deaths of community members, and ending with the ugly firing of the fire chief as he levelled accusations of negligent alcohol consumption in fire halls.

But instead of sitting around bemoaning our fate, locals stepped up, spoke out and got down to the business of finding solutions.

The most recent example of this strength of community character culminated Dec. 11 in the fun-filled and joyous Santa Claus parade. This year's parade was bigger and better than ever thanks not only to the efforts of organizer Shanda Dosanjh and her helpers, but also to the parade participants who came out in droves to show their support.

Another recent inspiring story came out of the decision to cut back funding for youth addictions outreach. Determined not to see their good work go to waste, the Squamish Breakfast Club, whose top mandate is drug prevention, pitched in a very generous amount to keep the outreach program running.

Another determined group is the Callaghan Valley Organizing Committee, which showed what Squamish is made of when members leveraged opportunities out of the newly built Whistler Olympic Park by becoming instrumental in its hosting of World Cup events, thus making it the de facto Squamish Olympic venue.

This tenacity was seen again when Squamish experienced significant loss of jobs as the highway improvement project wrapped up. Local workers took the opportunities provided by having a foot in the Kiewit door to join other massive projects in far-flung parts of Canada and beyond. And Squamish's youth are also taking advantage of the hands-on training they received during the construction boom to further careers.

The difficult times made the year's regular annual charitable events that much more heartwarming. Relay for Life, Balding for Dollars and Guns & Hoses are just a few of the initiatives that continue to bring the community together in its desire to improve the lives of family, friends and neighbours.

That determination also extends to the amazing accomplishments of the young people among us.

There's Clinton Shard who scaled Kilimanjaro to raise funds to fight his own disease, Crohn's. There are the intrepid travellers who journeyed to Africa to help orphaned and dreadfully impoverished children. There are the members of the secondary school Interact Clubs who approach their various fundraising tasks with zeal.

Those are the youth who challenge our expressions of exasperation ("Kids these days!") and lead us to believe future leadership rests in good hands.

Here's to closing the door on the challenges of 2009 and moving into 2010 with a firm hold on the generosity of spirit and the determination to improve the world which truly define Squamish.

– Sylvie Paillard

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