The search for a new CEO for the International Peace Garden near Boissevain has been narrowed down to a handful of applicants.

Board president Charlie Thomsen says they have slowly whittled down the number of prospective candidates to four.

Thomsen said their plan is to meet with those four people in early April to show them the Peace Garden facility, introduce them to the staff, meet members of the board and conduct face to face interviews.

"Out of that process we hope that we will be able to narrow it down to one final candidate."

A total of 36 applications were submitted for the CEO position and the quality of candidates was impressive, according to Thompsen.

"They're good candidates. They have a combination of a good vision for where the garden could go in the future, but they also have some good management skills. They're not novices but we expect they'll have new ideas that they will bring to the management of the garden and I think that's very healthy."

One of the other skills that the next CEO will need to posses is being able to handle the challenges that are unique to the position.

"If you were to speak to any of the older CEOs who have held that position they would tell you that it's a challenging job with unique political systems on both sides of border which implies different funding techniques, and then there is the location of the park. It's more of an isolated situation where you are away from large population bases and so you can't just run over to a store to pick up something or to meet with someone to provide a service. So, there are some difficulties that we encounter being in a remote area such as the garden."

The search for a new CEO got underway in mid January and Thomsen is confident they will have a new CEO in place this spring.