Great Lakes Islands Summit 2022

October 2nd - 5th, 2022

The Great Lakes Islands Summit (October 2nd - 5th, 2022) is being jointly hosted by the Lake Erie Islands of Kelleys, Middle Bass, Pelee, and South Bass. South Bass Island (also known as Put-in-Bay) will be the anchor island. We are excited to have a full agenda (coming soon!) that includes visiting four islands and discussing critical issues including infrastructure, tourism, land conservation, and water quality. The $100 registration fee includes your meals and all transportation between islands for the event. The event will begin at 5pm on Sunday, October 2nd with reception and dinner, and conclude on Wednesday at 4:30pm. Any island residents are welcome to attend. The annual summit also serves as the member meeting of the Great Lakes Islands Alliance (GLIA), a bi-national network of Great Lake island communities.

Additional information on how to get to the summit, where to stay, and more will be included in your summit confirmation email. For questions and more information, please contact Peter Huston at [email protected].

We hope that you can join us! Please register soon, space is limited. 

*The GLIA Summit will strictly follow all Covid protocols that are in place at the time of the Summit.*

The sessions on Monday and Tuesday will focus on South Bass, Middle Bass, and Kelleys Islands (U.S.), whereas Wednesday will focus on Pelee Island (Canada).  Full-event attendees are reminded to have a valid passport.  We are working with Customs to ensure a smooth border crossing and will notify you of any other required paperwork closer to the event.

About GLIA:

"The Great Lakes Islands Alliance encourages relationship building, fosters information exchange, and leverages resources to address shared challenges and embrace opportunities to benefit islands."

The Great Lakes contain the largest, most diverse collection of freshwater islands in the world. Of the 32,000 islands, nearly twenty continue to host communities of people, typically a mix of year-round and seasonal residents and visitors. 

While present-day island communities are uniquely distinct from one another in character, traditions, and geography, they share a number of complex, inter-related challenges, including: access to public services and quality education; supporting a diversified economy; managing natural, cultural, and historical resources across public and private boundaries; and changing demographics (size, age, seasonality, ownership, economic status, etc.). 

These challenges are hurdles, not immovable barriers. In fact, some island communities have already independently developed their own “island solutions to island challenges.” Island communities are finding they often have more in common with one another than to their adjacent mainland. There is great value in islanders learning from other islanders about best practices that work, as well as those that don’t.