City Receives Forest Funds

PORT ALBERNI – The city received a $300,000 cheque yesterday as the lone shareholder of the Alberni Valley Community Forest.

Chairman Jim Sears said they are in an excellent financial position and have held back some funds for bridge building next year.

Mayor Sharie Minions said past payments from the community forest allowed the city to purchase the Somass lands, and this latest payment could possibly be put towards a pool.

“Our standard for community forest dividend funds is for them to go into the reserve account until they can be used for a greater project, and the requirement for those projects is they have to benefit the whole Alberni Valley,” she said. “We likely will just wait until there’s something like possibly contributing to the pool or something else that they could be spent on, so they’ll just accrue for the time being.”