City of Yellowknife Economic Development Strategy 2020-2024
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City of Yellowknife Economic Development Strategy, 2020-2024 City of Yellowknife City Hall PREPARED FOR 4807-52nd Street Yellowknife, NT X1A 2N4 FWCO Management Consultants Ltd./ GGI Platform 210-314 W Cordova St BY Vancouver, BC V6B 1E8 Telephone: (778) 379-5590 ext. 1 [email protected] DATE April 3, 2020 City of Yellowknife –Economic Development Strategy Table of Contents 1. Introduction ................................................................................................................................ 1 1.1. Background ....................................................................................................................................................... 1 1.2. Project Objectives ........................................................................................................................................... 1 1.3. Work Completed to Date ............................................................................................................................. 1 1.4. Structure of the Document .......................................................................................................................... 4 2. Situational Analysis .................................................................................................................. 5 2.1. Overview of Current Economic Conditions .......................................................................................... 5 2.2. Economic Outlook........................................................................................................................................... 8 2.3. Implications for Economic Development Strategy ........................................................................ 11 3. The Economic Development Strategy ............................................................................. 13 3.1. Vision, Mission, Goals and Objectives for the City of Yellowknife ........................................... 13 3.2. Key Principles Underlying the Economic Development Strategy ............................................ 14 3.3. Objectives, Goals and Strategies ............................................................................................................ 15 4. Priority Actions and Performance Measurement .......................................................... 30 4.1. Priority Actions – Plans for Implementation .................................................................................... 30 4.2. Performance Measurement ..................................................................................................................... 37 Appendix I: List of Documents Reviewed .............................................................................. 39 Appendix II: List of Key Informants Interviewed................................................................ 43 Appendix III: Economic Profile of Yellowknife and NWT ................................................. 44 III.1. Overview of Yellowknife ......................................................................................................................... 44 III.2. The Northwest Territories: Economic Structure ........................................................................... 50 Appendix IV: Overview of Selected Sectors and Opportunities .................................... 53 IV.1. Mineral Industry .......................................................................................................................................... 53 IV.2. Tourism ............................................................................................................................................................ 57 IV.3. Post-secondary Education ....................................................................................................................... 61 IV.4. Revitalization of Downtown Yellowknife .......................................................................................... 63 IV.5. The Airport and Cold Climate Testing ................................................................................................. 66 IV.6. Agriculture and Fishing ............................................................................................................................. 68 IV.7. Value-added Manufacturing .................................................................................................................... 70 IV.8. Other Opportunities.................................................................................................................................... 70 City of Yellowknife –Economic Development Strategy Appendix V: Summary of the Research Results ................................................................... 74 V.1. Economic Outlook ...................................................................................................................................... 74 V.2. Advantages and Disadvantages of Being Located in Yellowknife ........................................... 77 V.3. Inter-relationship Between Economic Sectors ............................................................................... 78 V.4. Opportunities for Development ............................................................................................................ 80 V.5. Constraints to Development .................................................................................................................. 83 V.6. Recommended Priorities ......................................................................................................................... 86 Appendix VI: Overview of the 2014-2019 Economic Development Strategy ............ 91 City of Yellowknife –Economic Development Strategy Page 1 1. Introduction 1.1. Background Situated on the northern shore of Great Slave Lake, Yellowknife is the capital of the Northwest Territories (NWT). The city is located in the traditional territory of the Yellowknives Dene First Nation. It is a dynamic, inclusive community that combines modern amenities with a small-town feel and serves as the NWT’s primary hub for economic activity. With a population of 20,607 (2017), Yellowknife is the largest community in the NWT and makes up 46% of the territorial population. In recent years, it has benefited from a healthy economy: as of December 2019, Yellowknife posted a three-month rolling seasonally adjusted unemployment rate of 3.9% – markedly lower than the national rate of 5.6% and the rate of 13.8% for the remainder of the NWT. The city is home to a high proportion of well-educated families who earn some of Canada’s highest average household incomes (the average family income in 2015 was $160,394). Household expenditures are nearly 50% higher than the national household average. 1.2. Project Objectives This project involves the development of a five-year Economic Development Strategy (2020 to 2024) for the City of Yellowknife. The purpose of the strategy is to strengthen the economic base of the City and contribute to sustainable prosperity for residents and businesses. The decision to prepare an economic development strategy reflected two key considerations: the need to update the City’s previous economic development strategy, which covered the period of 2014 to 2019; and increasing concerns about the medium- and longer-term economic outlook for Yellowknife. The Strategy will detail: • Goals for economic development; • Specific strategies through which those goals will be realized; • Performance measurements for assessing the progress made; • An implementation plan which prioritizes the actions that will be taken in the short-term and long-term to implement the strategy. The strategy will define, for each action, the anticipated cost, the funding source and the lead or ‘champion.’ Implementation of the strategy will help to create an environment that is conducive to attracting and retaining investment that will create employment, diversify the City’s tax base and generate wealth throughout the City. 1.3. Work Completed to Date In preparing the economic development strategy, we are working closely with the Mayor's Task Force on Economic Development which was established to provide input into the development of the City of Yellowknife’s 2020-2024 Economic Development Strategy (the “Strategy”) and ongoing advice in the implementation of the Strategy. We met with the Task Force four times: City of Yellowknife –Economic Development Strategy Page 2 • Once to discuss their expectations for the strategy and review the methodology through which it would be developed; • A second time to discuss key opportunities and issues on which the strategy should focus as well as priority actions that the City should take to pursue these opportunities and address these issues; and • A third time to review the draft strategy, including the goals for economic development and specific strategies through which those goals will be realized. Based on the results, we then refined the goals and strategies and then developed a performance measurement strategy for assessing the progress made as well as an implementation plan which prioritizes the actions to be taken in the short-term and long-term. • A final time to review the implementation plan In preparing the draft strategy, we have conducted: • A review of research reports, plans, strategies, profiles, reports and other documents relevant to the City of Yellowknife and more generally the NWT. A list of some of the documents reviewed is provided in Appendix I. • 35 interviews with a