State of emergency lifted

The City of Calgary is expected to lift the state of emergency that has hung over the city since late last month.

Two weeks after the state of emergency was called in the City of Calgary, officials have lifted the order, but have maintained the Municipal Emergency Plan while recovery and relief efforts continue.

“Our work is now transitioning from city-wide emergency disaster response to localized recovery and relief efforts,” said Director of Calgary Emergency Management Agency Bruce Burrell in a release. “Now that the majority of our city is functional again, focus will shift to specific buildings and populations that are dealing with long-term flooding impacts. Public safety has always been, and continues to be, our first priority.”

Residents are still reminded to stay off the rivers and away from the riverbanks which may have become badly eroded and are not safe to venture onto.

With the state of emergency called off, the city says that the registration centre at the Centre Street Church has closed.

Officials made that decision because the majority of citizens have been connected and the need for such facilities has diminished.

Displaced residents are reminded to:

For counselling and emotional support services, please contact the Distress Centre’s crisis line at 403-266-4357. Trained volunteers are available to answer your call 24/7.

For information on community, health, social services and other agencies who can answer questions in many languages 24 hours a day, please call 211.

The three remaining community support centres, which were established to support citizens and business owners whose services were disrupted during the flood, will be closed as follows:

Mayor Naheed Nenshi said on Wednesday night that there were some surprises in the recovery process.

“It has come to our attention that some property managers have not responded to their buildings as quickly as we would have expected them to,” he said.

About 49 buildings managers have not made contact with the city to begin inspections that would allow residents to return home.

Nenshi hopes that condo board members will call the city themselves and not wait on the property managers to make the first move.

Meanwhile, thousands of condo and apartment residents are still out of their homes as a result.

Other highlights from Mayor Nenshi’s address included:

Earlier this week, the city announced that early estimates of the cost of damages are pegged at over $250M.