ICYMI: Our four-month investigation reveals that of 75 B.C. communities examined, more than two thirds do not have a detailed flood plan, have only parts of a plan or have just started a plan.
When Ben Campbell evacuated Monte Lake with wife Kami as wildfire threatened the B.C. Interior community last summer, the whole sky was blotted out by smoke with an orange glow.A day later, he learned everything on his property had gone up in flames: an old home where they were storing their belongings, a truck, two Harley Davidson motorcycles and a camper trailer.
Of 75 B.C. communities examined by Postmedia, more than two thirds do not have a detailed, costed flood plan, or have only parts of a plan or have just started work to create a plan.Article content Postmedia’s four-month examination drew from responses to questions put to more than 85 municipalities, First Nations and regional districts; thousands of pages of government-commissioned, academic and other independent reports, and community wildfire and flood protection plans and other municipal records; and dozens of interviews with community representatives, experts and those carrying out work to protect communities from floods and wildfires.The communities examined are home to 3.
Abbotsford Mayor Henry Braun at the Sumas dike breech at Cole Road, which is still closed after November’s flooding, on April 21, 2022.The District of Kent has a similar problem. It has just costed some short-term dike upgrades and riverbank protection at $6.5 million, a figure that could change “significantly.”
The city says it is exploring a long-term funding strategy but stresses funding from higher levels of government is “crucial.” In nearly two decades, less than 10 per cent of needed fuel clearing on more than 11,000 square kilometres has been completed. A key step in reducing wildfire risk in communities is to thin out trees, prune lower branches and remove forest-floor debris, so fire can’t climb or spread as easily. Such steps were credited with saving Logan Lake last summer from a raging wildfire.
“For far too long, we have been trying to solve this issue with a few dollars attached to a favourable media release, and we haven’t really accomplished much in the way of safer communities,” says Scott Driver, Cranbrook’s director of fire and emergency services.Postmedia’s findings underscore the colossal scope and huge cost of what is needed to harden communities to climate change.
During that period, the province spent just five per cent of that amount on reducing wildfire risk in and around communities, about $224 million, according to an analysis by Postmedia based on independent reports, government responses and cost estimates.It can include loss of habitat and wildlife, damage to watersheds, destroyed carbon storage, decreased home value and harm to health and mental health.
In Abbotsford, for example, Braun, the mayor, estimates response and recovery costs will total about $150 million, separate from what is needed to improve flood protection.Article content Glenn McGillivray, managing director of the Institute for Catastrophic Loss Reduction, an independent research institute affiliated with Western University in London, Ont., says a key problem is that disasters are treated like temporary blips.Article content
All of it puts the threat of climate change in stark relief, particularly the possibility of more frequent and severe rains and floods in the future, says Gagan Khakh.Khakh believes the province should figure out what are the highest priority areas for flood protection — and focus funding there — including in Abbotsford.But the focus now is on cleanup and recovery. It’s not clear how the B.C.
That strategy — a combined effort of provincial, federal, municipal and First Nation governments and other agencies such as YVR — is more than three years overdue. That includes targeting spending at areas that have higher risks to wildfire and floods, instead of funding driven by the ad hoc nature of grants, which may not be handed out by priority.
There is also a need for more regional planning and collaboration among all players, particularly when it comes to wildfires, which need the involvement of all levels of government, First Nations, private landowners, and the forest industry, say experts and those with communities at risk. He says while the province and some players have acknowledged what has happened, they have not reached the next step of aligning aspiration with strategy.This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below.“In B.C., we do not have a co-ordinated strategy that’s pulling in all the various bits and pieces under one umbrella.”A B.C.
Part of that funding is intended to go toward fuel thinning, but it is not clear how that work will be carried out and provincial forestry officials could not say how much work was planned. In a public post, the regional district cited concerns about the cost and ineffectiveness of implementing the change and suggested it should fall to the province to address the issue through building code changes.
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