Prince George, B.C. – Entrepreneurs from across  the country, including Prince George, are in Ottawa today for Startup Canada Day on the Hill.

They are there to discuss Canada’s Innovation agenda and local entrepreneur and Startup Prince George lead Shauna Harper is there providing some local perspective.

“We want to make sure there is a perspective in there that involves the fact that in today’s digital economy, that tech skills need to be a part of it. We need to make sure that we include entrepreneurial thinking and so we want to make sure that the funds are allocated in the right areas in order to grow that.”

She acknowledges one area the government could work on is raising funds to ensure Prince George has the proper internet infrastructure in place.

“It’s one of the topics of one of the policy meetings we’re going to. With our population size we need to be able to invest in infrastructure in order to attract the talent and attract the types of businesses, especially the technology businesses.”

Harper says downtown Prince George is sorely lacking in that regard.

“In the downtown core of Prince George the infrastructure for high speed internet isn’t there. We don’t have the fibre that’s needed. We have the optic lines in the Hart and College Heights but only for residential, not commercial. So that’s a big, big issue for our region.”

She says the tech strategy also must include a plan to ensure students get the training they need.

“When kids leave schools we want them to be having that innovative mind set but we’ve got to start younger.”

While in Ottawa Harper is scheduled to meet with MP’s, Parliamentary Standing Committees and ministers.