After years of working to put New Westminster on the map as a destination, Tej Kainth is moving on to a new endeavour.
Kainth, who has been at the helm of Tourism New Westminster for 11 years, is moving to Ontario to take on a newly created positon as the City of Mississauga’s tourism manager. She’s thrilled to be able to take the skills she’s honed in New Westminster and apply them on a much larger scale in Mississauga.
“I have done as much as I could do to the best of my ability here in New West,” she said. “For me, I needed to continue learning and growing in my career. Mississauga is a city of 800,000 people. It’s the sixth largest city in Canada.”
Kainth’s new job includes implementing the City of Mississauga’s tourism master plan and working with Toronto and neighbouring cities and Tourism Toronto on branding Mississauga as a tourist destination. While she’s looking forward to bringing a “visitor’s lens” to her new role in Mississauga, she’s proud of the work she’s been able to accomplish in her hometown.
“I can’t really put my name on any one specific thing because I am so proud of what this city has become. I was part of that. I was part of this growth and rebirth of New Westminster, becoming the city that it is today, over the last decade,” she said. “I think that’s my proudest moment – being part of the vision and being part of the discussion of how this city is changing and what we can do to continue putting New Westminster on the map.”
During her time at Tourism New West, first as a marketing coordinator and then as an executive director, Kainth initiated a number of projects and programs including Feast on the Fraser, Quest New West, a 150 Bucket List of things to do in New West, and many marketing and promotional events.
“I have seen it grow as a destination and it is going to continue to get bigger and more prominent in the type of destination we are becoming. I think there is a new wave of industry that has evolved here in New West and a strong passion and vision for where tourism is going to go,” she said. “I have had the honour of being an ambassador and champion outside this city and talking up New West and promoting the city. It’s always going to be a city that I will continue to promote no matter where I am in this world because it’s my hometown.”
Jorden Foss, chair of Tourism New West’s board of directors, said the organization is sad to see Kainth leave, but recognises it’s a great move for her professionally.
“I know she will take Mississauga to the next level, just like she did for our organization,” he said. “From a tourism perspective for us as a board, the timing of this to happen – we never wanted to lose Tej – but if there was ever a time she was going to move on, we have a fresh-faced board now with a lot of new business owners in the city. I think that the team we have now will be able to manage this and then bring somebody in.”
Foss said the board will sit down and determine if it wants to hire an executive director or go in a different direction, such as people for marketing or sales roles. In the meantime, Tourism New West has plans in place to continue staffing the tourism information centre at Anvil Centre, doing social media, launching its new website and making its appearance felt at various events taking place around the city this summer.
“I just want to say thank you to New West – the residents, the businesses, mayor and council, all of our community partners and organizations for believing in me and allowing me to grow with this city,” Kainth said. “I always say I am a product of New West. I am so proud to be from New Westminster and so happy that I got this opportunity to promote my hometown. Here I am now, going into a bigger city and taking all this knowledge and information and experiences I have been able to develop here and being able to apply that in a bigger context.”
