Most powerful

It’s it the first time an Okanagan woman has been twice named to the top 100 list of Canada’s most powerful women.

And Kelowna developer Renee Merrifield Wasylyk of Troika Management achieved the feat back-to-back.

The Women’s Executive Network put Wasylyk on the list for 2017 and just named her to 2018’s list this week.

The awards gala attended by 1,400 people to recognize the 100 women was held Thursday at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre.

“To be named the first time was surreal, but to be named two years in a row is simply life changing,” she said.

“I am honoured and humbled and this only increases my desire to serve my community.”

Wasylyk has been making headlines in Kelowna since arriving here 20 years ago and declaring there were no good jobs for women.

So, she created her own job and became one of the city’s most prolific and most-respected builders with developments such as Yaletown condominiums, The Gate and Green Square townhouses, Upper Avenue office building downtown and the lakefront West Harbour neighbourhood, which won community of the year a few years ago at the Thompson Okanagan Housing Awards (Tommies).

Along the way she was recognized more and more and her community involvement spread.

She’s also been named one of B.C.’s six most influential women and Kelowna Top Forty Under 40 and is the only Okanagan resident to sit on the Premier’s Women’s Economic Council.

She’s also involved with Breakfast Clubs of Canada, Central Okanagan Economic Development Commission, Urban Development Institute, Westbank First Nation Economic Development Commission and Downtown Kelowna Association.