James Edwards is the current executive director of the Huu-ay-aht First Nation and lives in Port Alberni with his wife Taira of 16 years and their two boys, Caiden and Blake.
His parents own and operate a small farm in Beaver Creek and both his brother and sister’s family live in Port Alberni. He has worked as a contaminants technician for the CCRIFC studying fish health in the Kootenay region. In Yellowknife, as an environmental scientist and project manager, he worked for the federal government managing a major environmental reclamation project while closely working with the ministry of transportation to ensure that ice roads were built and maintained.
He worked in Ottawa as a human health scientist focused on public health and contaminants research, and then as a project director for the Department of National Defence where he managed the reclamation of bomb sites across Canada.
His current work with the Huu-ay-aht includes taking an active role in the potential Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) facility and the Port Alberni Transshipment Hub (PATH). He has an undergraduate degree in chemistry and physics, a graduate certificate in project management and a Masters of Business Administration in International Business. Being born and raised on Vancouver Island, James and his wife Taira are happy to be back home and thankful that they can raise their boys in the Alberni Valley.