themmake the comments ‘What recession?
Whendidwe have a slowdown?’
“We’ve just been going full-steamhere.”
Indeed, the prolonged bottom-line success
for Grande Prairie has come thanks to a
diverse employment base that includes
Peace Country Health (3,400 employees),
several local school divisions and a regional
functionof the provincial government.
Alongside those private and public entities
is a significant footprint for both the
forestry and oil/gas industries, which
includes Weyerhaeuser Canada and
Canadian Forest Products along with
Halliburton Canada, Precision Drilling,
Schlumberger andTri-CanWell Service.
“When we saw that downturn in the
economy, a lot of it had to do with
residential markets,”King said. “People here
felt it if they were trying to sell a house or
buy a house, because house prices did drop a
bit. But for the most part, business carried
on up here and there was a lot of growth in
the oil and gas sector. We were fortunate
that a lot of the licenses that companies had
up here were coming due and they had to
24 | BusinessWorld |
July-August 2014
