Island Roots President: Mr. Larry Whaley

Larry Whaley
 
Background:

Larry’s mother and father were members of a co-op in the small Alberta town where he grew up so you might say he has the co-operative movement in his blood. After completing high school, Larry moved to Calgary and shortly after that to Burnaby. Almost on arrival, he joined the South Burnaby Credit Union.
 
 When the need to house his young family (in a very tight housing market) arose, Larry looked to co-operation for the answer. He and others from the Burnaby Tenants’ Association formed the Norman Bethune Housing Co-operative. The result was a co-operatively owned, family oriented, 24 unit housing development near Simon Fraser University in North Burnaby. From there he and his family made a weekly trip to a small food co-op to pick up the things they needed and support another part of the movement.
 
 In 1980 Larry accepted a transfer to Nanaimo where he became the BC Governments Family Financial Counselor for the area. He immediately joined the credit union and what is now the Mid Island Co-op. Later served 4 years on the board of that organization.
 
 Larry left his BC Government job in 1983. He traveled widely across Canada and became known throughout as the Borrowers’ Advocate for his efforts to assist those people who were having problems with financial institutions and for his outspoken criticism of the way banks treated customers who faced financial problems as a result of annual interest rates that reached into the 25% range.
 
 Early this century Larry became involved with another small co-operative. This one back in Burnaby. In 2008 the manager of the Burnaby Co-op died and Larry stepped into a more active role. Last year the members of that co-op decided, after more than 30 years of running a completely volunteer back yard business, that it was time to close, sell the assets and divide up the resulting cash.

Occupy Nanaimo
After listening to the comments of participants at general assembly of the Occupy Nanaimo group Larry heard it mentioned that many of the participants want to farm and he wondered how they could sell the items they might produce and if they could possibly make a living farming in this area. He then began a planning process that involved dozens of people and resulted in the creation of the Island Roots Market Co-operative.