Why I became a Director

“Why did I join the Board of Directors of the Hyack Festival Association and become a Hyack Director?”

Our Royal City and the people who call it home are very important to me. This is due to both my career as a Real Estate Agent for the past 30 years as well as my sense of community and love of our history. I have lived in this city all my life and am a 4th generation New West’r. I’ve been a member of the Hyack Festival Association for almost 40 years and have assisted with the Hyack Ambassador Program for decades. For years, I never thought about becoming a board member. I was just happy volunteering with the Ambassadors and doing what I could to help the youth of the city. But it became clear to me how important the Hyack Festival Association is to the City of New Westminster and how much help was needed to carry on the 50 year tradition of bringing fun, excitement and festivals to our city. Festivals create friendships, bond communities and bring smiles to all ages. Also, the opportunity to work with like-minded people on our B.O.D. is so enjoyable. I’ve met new people that I might not otherwise have met and realized how many other people feel just as passionate as I do about our city, its history, and about keeping its festivals alive. We have had decades of dedication from these hard-working volunteers and we hope to have decades more.

Back in 1972 our Mayor at the time, Mr. Muni Evers developed (what is now called) the Hyack Festival Association to take the burden and the cost of organizing and executing all of our City Fun days OFF of the staff at City Hall. He gathered a large group of people who wanted to “Serve their community – Represent their City” (our Ambassador motto) and our own New Westminster Festival Association was born. Over the last 48 years City Hall outside support has slowly decreased and we as an Association have struggled to continue to bring all those fun days to our citizens with smaller and smaller monetary support. Due to the decades of hard work done by so many people, we have been able to continue with our amazing International Parade (the largest in BC), our Uptown Street Festival, our Canada Day Fireworks and of course our original Hyack Ambassador Leadership Program. Unfortunately, we have not been able to continue with other loved events like Easter in the Park, the Easter Car Parade, Family Days, and The Santa Parade all of which used to be brought to you by the Hyack Festival Association. But new initiatives at City Hall and their new “festival department” are bringing new life back to the city and things will, hopefully, thrive again with the dedicated workers at the city who are also like-minded LIKE US and want to keep the fun alive.

But we (The Hyack Festival Association) need YOU…the citizens who care and are looking to volunteer their time and energy to keeping the fun alive. So, if you are interested in becoming a volunteer with any one of our committees and maybe even one day joining us on the B.O.D., please see our website at www.hyackfestival.com we would sure love to have you join us AND the FUN!!

Come Fun with Us!!