BBOT Presents to Burnaby City Council on Expansion to Inter Municipal Business License Program

After advocating for a pilot program to allow businesses that work across city boundaries to be able to get one interchangeable business license, the Burnaby Board of Trade again appeared before Burnaby City Council on March 7th to argue for an expansion of the program to allow businesses in the construction and trades-related sectors to be able to work in any city from Hope to West Vancouver with a single inter-municipal business license.

In 2013, the BBOT successfully advocated to city council to join with 5 other Lower Mainland municipalities (Vancouver, New Westminster, Richmond, Surrey, and Delta) to create a pilot program to allow businesses to be able to secure an inter-municipal business license which would allow them to legally operate in any of the participating cities.  Previously, businesses would have to apply for a new license in each city they wished to do business in, a costly and time-consuming burden.  This past fall, the pilot program was made permanent between the six participating municipalities.

Burnaby, along with its colleagues in the region’s Chamber of Commerce network, are now spearheading a call for this model to be expanded across the Lower Mainland.  The BBOT thanked City Council for its willingness to adopt the inter-municipal business license program in 2013 and encouraged them to build on that success with the proposed expansion.

You can view the BBOT’s presentation to Burnaby City Council on the City of Burnaby’s website Here.