Hi Bear Friends,

This message goes out to anyone that may be interested or may know of a group or individual that is interested in taking over the established North Shore Spring Bear Festival Society, incorporated as a non-profit in Aug, 2006, …requiring 3 directors and maintenance of a bank balance of approx.$5,600 with the mandate of educating the community in bear awareness thru a community event such as a festival. Spring is a great time to remind the community to be ‘proactive’ and ‘informed’ where bears and non-natural attractants are concerned

For more information go to website at: www.northshorebearfest.com . The Society could be taken over by a group outside of the North Shore, requiring a name change with the BC Societies Office in Victoria, though monies in account would not be transferred to a non-North Shore group.

At present there are three directors, myself being Chair. If I have received no expressions of serious interest by June 2008, we will disband the Society. At that time any monies left in account will go towards possibly bear bins and/or interpretative signage for one or all of the three municipalities on the North Shore.

It is the current director’s suggestion that the next Bear Festival could be held in Spring of 2009 and that it could be done on a small scale perhaps hosting one guest speaker one night and a family educational day the following day? The Festival could also be done in a conference format working thru a post-secondary institution? Any and all information acquired thru the hard work of setting up the First Spring Bear Festival ie.working notes on participants, funders, volunteers, tax returns, grant applic’s etc…would be given over to an appropriate new executive. Also there would be present and future consultation available thru the existing three directors to help make a future Festival a great success.

I believe the community of the North Shore would welcome a Second Annual Spring Bear Festival and there would be significant financial support available from governmental and business agencies, as required. Please contact me with any expressions of interests or with possible contacts.

Thank You and Merry Christmas,

Barb Murray
Chair,
NS Spring Bear Festival Society