B.C. Spirit Squares is administered by the Ministry of Community and Rural Development working in partnership with the Ministry of Tourism, Culture and the Arts. The program is part of BC150; an initiative celebrating the province’s 150th anniversary. By creating community outdoor spaces the Spirit Squares program helps advance the goals of ActNow BC, a province-wide health promotion initiative focused on encouraging British Columbians to live healthier lives by being more physically active.
Ministry of Community and Rural Development
The Ministry of Community and Rural Development's mandate is to promote sustainable, liveable communities that provide healthy and safe places for British Columbians. The ministry’s goals include: ensuring community governance is open, effective and accountable to its citizens; British Columbians live in resilient, sustainable communities; communities effectively meet the social and economic needs of their citizens.
Ministry of Tourism, culture and the Arts
The mandate of the Ministry of Tourism, Culture and the Arts is to provide leadership and focus to the tourism, culture and arts sectors in order to foster job creation, business development, dynamic communities, and healthy, active citizens. The ministry’s goals include: fostering a tourism sector that delivers lasting regional economic and social benefits; creating vibrant and creative communities in which people have diverse opportunities to participate in recreation, arts and culture; and effectively joint stewardship of British Columbia’s outdoor recreational resources and heritage.
BC150
BC150 celebrates the adventures, struggles, people, events and achievements that have shaped our provincial identity. In the last 150 years, we’ve experienced tremendous cultural, economic and innovative growth that has brought British Columbia to where we are today. It’s time to celebrate that. Celebrate where we are, and who we are - British Columbians one and all.
The strategy is simple: a core of events that captures the imagination and shows we have a lot to be proud of. At the same time, we’re building bridges with First Nations, diverse cultures, communities, business, educators and arts and culture organizations to give them the support and tools they need to ensure that everyone is part of the celebration.
ActNow BC
ActNow BC is the health promotion platform helping British Columbians live healthier lives. By 2010, ActNow BC’s objectives are to have a population of British Columbians that: eats healthier; becomes more physically active; maintains a healthy weight; reduces, quits or avoids tobacco use and makes healthy choices in pregnancy. The goals of ActNow BC are to make BC the healthiest jurisdiction to host the Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games, to inspire commitment to create a BC that makes the healthy lifestyle choice the easy choice for everyone and to improve the overall health of British Columbians.