Is Revelstoke on the way to being completely gentrified?

This story first appeared in the March 2021issue of the Revelstoke Mountaineer magazine. Read the e-edition here:

We’re at a tipping point in Revelstoke. A lot has changed since I first moved here in 2006, and more continues to change at a more dramatic rate. With the rise of housing prices now at unattainable rates for the demographic who were part of making Revelstoke what it is, it’s a mountain town version of gentrification.

It’s easy to get upset about the rising real estate market or the shift in a community that’s become more of have and have-nots. Yet, the only way to make a prolific and sustainable community plan is to ask the question, “Who do we want to be?” What is the culture we want to build? Let’s look at what it is that made Revelstoke the glorious little mountain town that originally attracted developers and citizens before it hit the global map in 2008. It wasn’t the fancy houses or the high priced stickers associated with them. For some it was job opportunities with Downie, CPR and BC Hydro, while others were moved by the mountains and the recreation lifestyle. We moved here for the lifestyle and for a quieter pace of life; living here we became part of a community that knows, supports and regularly connects with one another.

The thing is, we can’t all sit in the nirvana of this beautiful town and focus on our own recreation time and selves solely. We must engage and put effort into the community and the culture we want to continue to build. The more we focus on ourselves and our own needs, the more we create separation and a community whose inhabitants are based in trying to be the best athlete or have the most amount of recreating time. If we do this, we lose the essence of why we moved here. We can become consumers of ourselves, popularity and money, or we can choose differently. What builds a beautiful home (the inside, not the outside)? It’s kindness, compassion, patience and hard work; it’s helping each other out, listening to each other, showing up when it’s hard and making difficult decisions with our families’ well-being at the center of those choices. I’m not suggesting we have to give up the things we love, but I’m acknowledging that we have to be part of the world we want to create.

Over the years I’ve lamented over the way we tend to hide from the world here. We intentionally disconnect from the outside world, living in our own agendas and bubble of a valley that by its very design disconnects us from other communities. People frequently boast to me how they don’t listen to the news or educate themselves on the outside world. If we’re not paying attention to what’s happening globally, how are we paying attention locally? You can’t halfway disconnect. Once you disconnect, you disconnect from it all. We’re also living in a world that advocates superficiality.  Do we want that vision for Revelstoke or do we want something different? What about co-creating community relationships that are about listening to each other, not about being right. What about this: we play an active role in our communities – prioritizing our culture and how we want to feel collectively overlooking pretty on the outside.

When you choose to have a family or a relationship, you begin to design your home, home being the fundamental place of support and love. You decide on the artifacts to the food you’re buying to (consciously or unconsciously) how you’ll speak to each other, how much time you’ll create for recreation and friends, what level of respect you’ll offer to yourself, partner and possibly children. In a healthy home you recognize everything isn’t always balanced; there will be times when one person has to hold the lion’s share of the work. Point being, in a lifelong commitment there are goals for the future, and hopefully the person we’re with wants to support us and we want to support them.

We can develop a community whose philosophy can sustain a positive future for our planet, ourselves and the generations to come. We have to think outside the box, have to dramatically change the way the ‘city’ relates to our community members and how we as a community relate to the city. In order to heal struggles we have to admit our wrongs and get uncomfortable as we seek for resolution, solutions and problem solving.

What if we started with the business owners – people who know what it takes to put sweat equity into building a vision – instead of focusing on the city, which is bound by bureaucracy and red tape? What if we constructed our businesses with an intention of serving this community? What if we cared about how we impact the community more than the bottom line? (Which most businesses already demonstrate). We absolutely need to make money in order to have a business, but most businesses weren’t started to make millions — there was a deeper purpose. If businesses made it their mission to create a positive environment for their employees, how would that change the way they affect our community?

What’s our purpose? Apple’s original purpose was to get a computer in every household. But is that really building relationships, or rather dependency? Do we want to think of our community in terms of dollar signs or as something different? Do we want to value those who can only afford high housing prices, the patriarchal values of ‘power over’ versus connecting and building together? What if we looked at what’s going astray in our community planning (or lack thereof) and take action to stop being in responder mode of ‘putting out fires’ and move to creation mode?

We’ve got to be willing to let go of the things that aren’t working and move on to new things. What makes a company’s culture, what’s worth keeping and what’s worth re-evaluating and changing? What are we holding on to that is blocking the way for new ideas and evolution, which may actually help grow our community?

Culture change is hard. Apparently only fifteen percent of companies that go through some kind of radical restructuring and culture change are successful. So how do we keep what is working and consciously make positive change for the future? We need to decide what the goals of our community are so that leaders can demonstrate the ideals of the desired community ethos. If they’re not willing, we will have something to measure and make the appropriate changes.

If our mission is not worrying about how you get it done but just getting it done, then we’re creating a culture of distrust and disharmony. If we have any single person or group of people that are destroying trust and being disrespectful and we don’t do something about it, we’re being complacent in creating a community without integrity. This may be a huge call to action, or a big idea to try to pull together conscious culture in our community — conscious culture means a culture that is defined by us versus just following the societal norms, because that’s what we’ve always done in the past. But what if we created a healthy culture (as defined by Brene Brown) which includes diversity, inclusion, equity and belonging? A community comes together when it’s united. It’s not a matter of having the same perspectives or ideas, it’s about the foundation of the town having a collective mission. What would that look like for Revelstoke?