Mike is a Lawyer and politician who served on Vancouver City Council and was Mayor of Vancouver from 1980 to 1986. He was the 30 th Premier of the Province of British Columbia from 1991- 1996. Among his noteworthy achievements as Premier was the safeguarding of more than 12% of the province’s land base resulting in 500 newly protected areas. He also created the BC Treaty Commission, the province’s neutral body for facilitating treaty negotiations among the governments of Canada, BC and the province’s indigenous groups. He is a passionate supporter of indigenous economic development and has served on many economic development committees with indigenous groups including the Musqueam. His many honours include the Freedom of the City awarded by Vancouver Civic Council and being named an Officer of the Order of Canada. In 2014, along with Sid Katz, Mike founded the Dogwood-25 Society, a province-wide education strategy to increase Aboriginal student high school graduation rates.
