Forestry minister says more federal funding would make a big difference in wildfire preparedness, prevention

Minister of Forestry and Parks, Todd Loewen, speaks with Alberta Primetime host Michael Higgins about the wildfire situation in the province.

Forestry and Parks Minister Todd Loewen speaks with Alberta Primetime host Michael Higgins about the wildfire situation in the province.

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

Michael Higgins: Evacuation orders have been expanded in the County of Grande Prairie, as well now as the Municipal District of Greenview. What’s that say about conditions up in your corner of the province?

Todd Loewen: It’s definitely dry and we’ve had quite a bit of lightning that came through earlier that created a bunch of fires. And with high winds that we’ve been having, it’s a perfect scenario for these forest fires to ignite and to grow, and that’s the problem.

There’s a lot of fire in the landscape right now, and with the high winds we’ve been having, they’ve been growing exponentially as well.

MH: Whether it’s the northwest or anywhere else, how would you frame the start of wildfire season in our province and the degree to which it’s testing Alberta’s ability to respond?

TL: The first three weeks of May wasn’t that bad. We had a high number of fires, but we were able to get on them quick, and weather conditions allowed us to control those fires pretty quickly. But the last week of May and into June, the lightning came through, and it has a static capacity.

As far as our firefighting ability, we’ve been bringing in resources from other provinces and from other states, and soon here we’ll be bringing in people from outside the country, some American crews, Australians as well, maybe even Costa Rica, maybe Mexico. We’ll see who has firefighters to spare.

We’re working through the Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre, and they arranged a lot of our people to come in and help from around the world and across the country.

MH: Other provinces, including Ontario, now have requested assistance from the federal government. Where is Alberta in that queue? Is it in the queue?

TL: The only help we’ve ever had from the feds, really, has been when we use the military, and of course, they do provide some funding along the way, too. It’d be nice to see more and more help from the feds. We send a lot of money to Ottawa that they distribute. It’d be nice to have a lot of that coming back to Alberta and helping with the firefighting situation.

MH: What degree of communication do you have with the minister of emergency management and community resilience, newly elected Alberta MP Eleanor Olszewski, and how do those communications compare with dynamics that played out in the wake of that destructive fire in Jasper last year?

TL: I haven’t communicated directly, but that communication might be going on through our emergency services minister, Minister (Mike) Ellis. I reached out to Manitoba, the minister there, talking about the situation they have there.

Earlier in the season, we were actually providing help to Manitoba and to Ontario, because we were a little on the slower side early in May, but now we need our resources back, and so they’ve all moved back home. Now we’re asking for help from across the country and around the world.

MH: We set up the conversation on expanding calls for a national fire service. The Canadian Association of Fire Chiefs says we’re the only G7 country without a national fire administration. Where does Alberta’s government stand on those calls?

TL: We haven’t come up with anything particular that we want to focus on when it comes to that strategy. We know that we have a good organization here, Alberta Wildfire does great work, we have good personnel here.

When it comes to resources, I think that’s where we could use some help from the feds. Again, we transfer a lot of money to Ottawa and Ottawa doesn’t transfer that much back. If they could transfer some of that back to help us with our fighting wildfire, that’d be appreciated.

MH: Fighting wildfires, that is a provincial responsibility, isn’t it?

TL: Yes, it is. Other than the national parks.

MH: OK, so how different an approach do you see the federal government needing to take to this whole conversation? What or could that involvement look like to come from the feds?

TL: We’ll be in further conversations as time goes forward, but as it is right now, we could use the resources, the financial resources, to be able to bring in the help that we need.

The federal government right now, they’re not set up to fight fire at all right now –other than Parks Canada; they have their own firefighting abilities and crews and things like that.

The provinces have that. If the feds wanted to get in, if they were to help pay for some of the expenses that we have, that would be a big help. And again, we have the Canadian Interagency Forest Fire Centre that we work with. That’s a great organization that really does help link us up to resources.

MH: We’re only approaching mid-June, many weeks left. How concerned are you about where this wildfire season is headed?

TL: Always concerned. You never know what the weather is going to bring and what’s going to happen. The majority of our issues right now were started by a band of dry lightning that moved through the province and followed by 30-degree temperatures and high winds.

If we can avoid situations like that throughout the rest of summer, we might not be in too bad of shape, but we already have enough hectares on fire right now that we do have a long summer ahead of us, working on getting those fires extinguished.