No dice for Clearwater’s latest push to bring back permanent BC Wildfire initial attack crews

CLEARWATER, B.C. — The North Thompson region has gone without permanent initial attack crews through the BC Wildfire Service for the past several wildfire seasons. However, the mayor of Clearwater says the community isn’t going to give up on its push to see those crews return to the area — even if it means exploring a way to fund and create its own initial attack crews.

Clearwater Mayor Merlin Blackwell says BC Wildfire pulled the two permanent initial attack crews out of the area several years ago. Since then, the district has been vocal in its desire to see the firefighters return.

“Considering Clearwater is at a high risk of wildfire, is a high lightning strike zone, it didn’t really make much sense to us,” notes Blackwell.

The mayor says he recently spoke to BC’s forests minister about the issue, but the province hasn’t budged.

“A lot of it is the same reasons I’ve heard year over year. [They] can’t attract people to live in Clearwater, lack of ability to hire people in general for these positions and we know that the BC Wildfire Service has had a recruiting issue for a couple of years, along with a morale issue — so I can see that, for sure.”

The other option the district has would be to form its own community-based initial attack crew, or have one created through the Wells Gray Community Forest. However, Blackwell says that would require enough money to pay for the equipment and training costs, and enough people willing to take part in it.

“Simpcw First Nation also has its own crews that work in conjunction with BC Wildfire Service so that’s another model. But all of these are sort of longer term plans and are not cheap options to do,” notes Blackwell. “And once we do them, we’re setting a precedent across B.C. for other communities that they would probably have to hop on board this sort of model, or look like they’re not serving their citizens the way that we are.”

While the latest answer from the BC government hasn’t been what Clearwater wants to hear, the mayor says the conversation isn’t over.

“For now, it’ll be UBCM (convention in September), probably, the next time I get the opportunity to advocate for this. But we’re not going to give up on this. We can’t give up on this. There’s too much at stake.” reiterates Blackwell.