MIKE FUREY

Mike Furey has a career spanning more than three decades in the federal, provincial, and municipal levels of Canadian government. Mike has held executive positions in Ottawa, Victoria, Vancouver and Whistler. He has provided advice to federal and provincial Cabinet ministers, municipal mayors and Councils and represented government in many public forums. Mike’s work has taken him to large and small municipalities and Indigenous communities across British Columbia while representing government. He has an informed understanding of the challenges and opportunities of running a municipality combined with an appreciation of the roles and responsibilities of provincial and federal governments in British Columbia.

Mike was the CAO, Resort Municipality of Whistler from 2011-2020 and managed an organization of more than 500 employees and an annual budget of $100 million. Prior to joining Whistler, he was Assistant Deputy Minister, Local Government, with the Ministry  of Community, Sport and Cultural Development and was responsible for provincial relationships with local governments across BC.  At that time, he was BC’s Inspector of Municipalities with the primary roles of providing oversight of key local government financial and tax matters; supporting the overarching framework of local government accountability and helping ensure the financial health and stability of all local governments in B.C.

Mike was also Assistant Deputy Minister responsible for treaty and economic agreements with BC’s Ministry of Indigenous Relations and had a lead role in building a new relation between government and Indigenous communities. From 1986 to 2004, Mike worked with the Government of Canada in Vancouver and Ottawa. In Ottawa, he was Senior Director with Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada and worked on building federal support for residential school survivors. This work informed Canada’s path to reconciliation with residential school survivors.  For much of 1990’s, Mike worked in Vancouver as a senior federal negotiator and was instrumental in the settlement of the historic Nisga’a Treaty Agreement-in-Principle.

Mike holds a Bachelor of Arts and Bachelor of Education from Memorial University of Newfoundland and a Master’s in Public Administration, Queen’s University. Mike is married and has a 16-year-old son and 18-year-old daughter. He is an avid skier and mountain biker. Mike has been appointed as the Acting Auditor General for Local Government since 17 September 2020.