Port Moody may be known as the City of the Arts and B.C. may be the Greatest Place on Earth, but a movement is underway to have New Westminster declared as the Poetry Capital of British Columbia.

Poetry New Westminster, a newly formed society that includes poet laureate emeritus Don Benson and current poet laureate Candice James, is seeking to have New Westminster dubbed the Poetry Capital of British Columbia. The group has sought support for the designation from the Arts Council of New Westminster and will be asking city council to endorse the proposal.

Benson said the idea came about because poetry has "exploded" in New Westminster in the past decade.

"We were the first community in British Columbia to have a poet laureate and the first, later on, to have a poet laureate emeritus," he said. "There are a number of groups that have sprung up around town."

Benson, who was on a committee charged with selecting a new poet laureate and receives poetry submissions for a column from local poets, believes New Westminster has more poets per capita than any other city in B.C.

"It's a matter of image," said Benson, noting New Westminster was once known as the City of Champions. "We could justify that at the time. That's gone by the wayside. Times have changed."

Benson said New Westminster city council would need to support designating New Westminster as the Poetry Capital of British Columbia in order for it to occur.

"The word is out that both Victoria and Surrey want to be considered the same thing," he said. "That is through the poetry grapevine."

The poetry community is alive and well in the Royal City, where groups like Slam Central, Poetic Justice and World Poetry Night Out meet regularly.

Benson believes the time is right for New Westminster to claim its rightful place as the Poetry Capital of British Columbia.

Coun. Jaimie McEvoy said he's supportive of the concept, but wants city staff to review the matter to see if there's a basis for supporting the designation.

"For me the issue is if you have a vibrant activity in the city, in this case it could be poetry, how do you recognize it in a way that gives inspiration," he said. "You might not say Poetry Capital at the end of the day. You might come up with something else."

Whatever is decided, McEvoy said there's no doubt that New Westminster has a vibrant poetry scene and history.

"The poetry scene in New Westminster is fantastic and dates back 150 years," he said.

McEvoy raised the issue at Monday's council meeting, but some council members hadn't seen any of the correspondence on the matter so deferred the issue.

"There is a bit of bravado," he said about designating the city as the Poetry Capital of British Columbia. "That bravado is completely consistent with everything that goes on around us."

The Arts Council of New Westminster has been asked to support Poetry New Westminster's request for the city to be designated as the Poetry Capital of British Columbia. The board of directors will discuss the request at its next meeting.

"I am a little bit cautious about it. I would like to have a fuller discussion. Around the table, I think we have different opinions," said Rick Carswell, president of the Arts Council of New Westminster. "My concern is process. We have to have process. We are interested in the concept. We want to take a look at it."

Greg Magirescu, the city's manager of arts and cultural development, offered his thoughts on the designation in a memo to city council. He asked council to "carefully consider the full implication of such a self-appointed designation".

"In my opinion, unless we are legitimately awarded such a designation by a recognized third-party literary organization or professional entity, self-designation may subject us to scrutiny in the long run," he wrote.

Magirescu noted that it could easily be argued that several cities in Canada could claim the "poetry capital" title. He also suggested the city's decision to give itself the Poetry Capital of B.C. could work against it in the future, when seeking grants from the federal government.