NEWS - June 15, 2026

Esquimalt: The Place to Be – and the Place to Test a New Idea

Posted by Gwen Patrick
Image Credit: Township of Esquimalt

The Announcement

This spring at BCEDA (British Columbia Economic Development Association)‘s B.C. Economic Summit in Penticton, British Columbia, Terése Finegan and I were joined by Brian Cant, president of 4TVI (Tourism Vancouver Island) on stage to make a special announcement. 

Economic Nutrition has been growing exponentially over the past year, and it seemed fitting that we take to the stage at the conference to share the groundbreaking news. We were thrilled to announce that beginning in September 2026, the Township of Esquimalt will become the first community in British Columbia to host an Economic Nutrition certification cohort. 

4TVI will also support a broader Vancouver Island rollout of the program in 2027. 

Esquimalt as an Economic Nutrition Regional Cohort Partner

The Township of Esquimalt is well-positioned to lead this initiative in their region. I’ve followed their work for quite some time, having been particularly inspired by their approach to economic development that centres place. 

Esquimalt is a municipality of about 18,000 on the southern tip of Vancouver Island, sitting next to the city of Victoria and shaped by a long, meandering waterfront. Characterized as “The Place to Be”, Esquimalt balances its natural beauty with economic potential as the Township takes an intentional approach to economic stewardship. It’s a community that values connection, collaboration, and quality of life. 

For Terése, who stepped into Esquimalt’s newly created Manager of Economic Development role in July 2023, the announcement marked another milestone in a stretch of momentum that has been building toward strengthening the local Esquimalt economy. After the Summit announcement, we sat down to talk through how the Township of Esquimalt had created a new municipal economic development function to improve the region’s economic wellbeing through business attraction and community engagement – and where Economic Nutrition fits into the work. 

In 2014, the Township of Esquimalt completed a comprehensive economic development strategy, and in 2020, in partnership with South Island Prosperity Partnership, they completed a Business Investment Roadmap. Both plans identified the same gap: Esquimalt needed a dedicated person to carry the work forward.  

Photo Credit: Deb Price

Building on Existing Foundations

When Terése arrived in 2023, she did something a bit unusual – she didn't commission a new strategy. "I looked at all the previous work done. I didn't want to go back out and get another strategy done," she says. "I synthesized themes and focused on what was doable."

What came out of that exercise was a two-and-a-half-year action plan: a sequenced list of foundational work designed to help the new function take shape and grow over time.
First came a relationship management system. Terése took the Township's business licence data and converted it into a relationship database, with notes, emails and meeting context attached to every business in the community.

Then came communication. Terése now sends a monthly newsletter to hundreds of local businesses. "The intent of the business newsletter is to showcase, internally and externally, that we are business friendly," says Terése. "There's an expectation sometimes that everybody in the community nerds out over agendas and bylaws and knows every word we've written off by heart. They do not." 

The first section of each newsletter distils what's happening in local government. The community has found the newsletter invaluable. An industry group recently emailed Terése to thank her for flagging an upcoming report they would have missed. I even personally subscribe to it and read it every month despite no longer living in the region.

The next foundation was identity. Terése kept hearing the same line from developers and outside partners: Esquimalt is five kilometres from downtown Victoria. That was the pitch. "We can do better than that," Terése decided.

She ran a community survey and held open houses, and Esquimalt: The Place to Be emerged: a wordmark, a colour palette, and a vocabulary that is friendly and inclusive. Building the brand had an effect Terése hadn't anticipated. It cemented her own sense of belonging to a place she had only recently arrived in. "When I arrived here, people would ask how I was settling in. And I said, everyone is just so warm and welcoming – like receiving a big hug. That is Esquimalt. They are just going to pull you in for a hug, no matter where you're from. It's a very inclusive community."

The brand needed a home, so the Township launched whyesquimalt.ca, which includes a business directory, business development resources, investment data, and a growing space for community storytelling. The most recent piece of the road map is a Community and Visitor Guide, now in circulation across the township and has already received thousands of downloads.
"We've got a good foundation now," she says. "People are aware of the economic development department, and businesses are reaching out all the time for support, resources, and information." But, foundations like these only work if the rest of the organization is in the room. Many people in similar economic development roles that I've personally spoken with describe the same challenge: overcoming cross-functional gaps in the municipality itself.

Being the Annoying Relative

Terése's solution was simple. She invited herself to the other departments.  

"I became like that annoying relative that just shows up at meetings," she told mesays. In her first week, she identified development services (planning, zoning, land use) as the team she would likely interact with the most. She started inviting herself to their weekly meetings and has now become an informal member of the team. 

"Every meeting, I take an opportunity to tell them what economic development has done that week, so they get to learn what we do. I hear what they are working on, keeping my ears open for any intersecting opportunities, issues or challenges." she says. She has also made a point of checking in regularly with parks and recreation, HR, fire services, and other departments. Each department has its own personality and operating culture, and part of the work is learning how each one moves. 

The throughline in everything Terése has helped shape is storytelling. The newsletter, the website, the brand, the visitor guide – it is all about giving people a way into Esquimalt.  

"When we share our story, where we're from, the connections we have. It connects us to place." That instinct, that businesses and communities grow stronger when they have a way to tell their story, is exactly what drew Terése to Economic Nutrition.
 

Economic Nutrition's Benefit to Businesses

The Township is launching its regional certification cohort in September 2026, making the certification available to local businesses. It is also joining the Town of Newmarket as one of the first municipalities in Canada to publish its own Economic Nutrition certification to show where their money goes. I asked Terése why she saw Economic Nutrition as a tool for local government – and she responded with a statement that I couldn’t agree more with: “I saw it as a disruptor tool.” 

It was a different conversation piece she could have with internal teams in how they spend their money externally. “From a municipal perspective, I knew it would create a little bit of a jolt. And we know it did. That was unsurprising.


What also drew her was the value to businesses themselves. "The benefit to the businesses is how they could tell their story, how they could communicate to their customers. It creates a powerful interactive engagement tool with consumers to have conversations with businesses."

Same instinct, new tool. Economic Nutrition gives businesses a clear way to show what their dollar means in their community – a story told in numbers and visuals –rooted in a concept that underpins effective economic stewardship: showing where the money goes. But it’s not just the label or the certification mark; it’s participating in an initiative that shifts ways of thinking around purchasing and procurement practices. Hearing Terése’s story of activating her work through collaboration reminds me of the opportunities that communities can unlock when they come together to strengthen their places.

Better Together

While Esquimalt is the first place in B.C. to host its own Economic Nutrition certification cohort, Terése has been clear from the beginning that this is not an Esquimalt-only initiative. She will be actively keeping neighbouring municipalities and local First Nations informed and engaged as the cohort takes shape.

“We are better together, we can only grow if we grow together,” she says. “In our region of 13 municipalities, when a visitor comes here, they don’t know they’ve crossed 13 municipalities. There’s no passport control between Esquimalt and Victoria. From the outside, this place is seen as one. It’s the same as how people see Vancouver Island, B.C., and even Canada. We are one big team.”

The point is practical, not just philosophical. Resources are finite. “If we continue to duplicate all the time, we are just sinking slowly, some places quickly. The more we can do together, the greater the benefit is amplified and the quicker we get to our goals.”

If another municipality is reading this and wondering whether to start its own economic development function, or how to grow one that has stalled, Terése has advice: Call her. “I love to share what I’ve learned. We are better together, and that means sharing information,” she says. 

The second piece of advice Terése offers is to listen before you act. “In earlier roles, I sometimes came in hot, ready to change things right away. Over time, I’ve learned that it’s better to start by listening more than you talk, taking the time to understand the place before deciding how to move. That’s still a work in progress for me, because there is also a need to watch the pace and make sure you’re not simply slipping into the status quo. There is a fine line between listening well and getting lulled into ‘this is the way we’ve always done it.'”

The third is to find your people. “Joining BCEDA [BC Economic Development Association] is a good starting place. Go fish where the fish are. Hang out with like-minded people and get energized by what everybody else is doing.”

Esquimalt is a small place doing a lot, in part because the work has been embedded in relationships, listening, and community priorities. The Economic Nutrition certification cohort in September is the next expression of that approach: a tool with a tailored local rollout, backed by a growing national network of businesses committed to putting place at the front of how they spend.

Interested in becoming Economic Nutrition Certified?

Learn more