The B.C. NDP has a message for residents impacted by wildfires raging across British Columbia.
“Whatever it takes,” Premier-designate John Horgan told a group of reporters at Thompson Rivers University on Sunday afternoon.
“Whatever we need to make sure people are whole after this, we’re going to do that.”
The premier-designate was in Kamloops on Sunday, touring the Emergency Operations Centre at Thompson Rivers University, speaking with evacuees and addressing questions about what his government will do when it takes power later this month, on July 18.
Asked for a response to B.C. Premier Christy Clark’s announcement earlier Sunday that the provincial government has given $100 million in funding to the Canadian Red Cross to help wildfire victims, Horgan didn’t shy away from affirming the promise.
“I assure you my government will do everything it can to make sure British Columbians are made as whole as possible,” he said.
Horgan said the province has firefighting supports en route from Alberta, Saskatchewan and Ontario. It is expected that 300 firefighters will arrive in B.C. on Monday and Tuesday, adding to the 1,000 firefighters and 200 contractors already battling the blazes.
He also has the support of the federal government, he said, noting Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s message earlier Sunday that, “The federal government stands ready.”
Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale confirmed Ottawa would send federal assistance to help with the provincial state of emergency.
There is the possibility the military will be brought into the province as well. The Minister of National Defence, Harjit Sajjan, is in the B.C. and has spoken with Horgan.
“That’s a call that is up to John Rustad,” Horgan said, referring to the MLA for Nechako Lakes. “I am the premier-designate and Mr. Rustad is the point here. He is responsible and I defer to him.
“That will happen, I believe, if the situation continues to escalate.”
The B.C. Wildfire Service estimated Sunday that the number of evacuees across the province is likely to rise from the last estimate of 7,000.
“The situation around evacuation alerts and orders could be quite fluid,” said Kevin Skrepnek, chief information officer for the B.C. Wildfire Service.
“I would anticipate there would be expansions over the next few days.”
A total of 220 wildfires are burning throughout the province. The B.C. Wildfire Service was notified of 240 new starts on Friday and Saturday alone.
Topping the list of priorities are the Gustafsen fire west of 100 Mile House (3,200 hectares, 107 firefighters), the 150 Mile House fire (2,500 hectares), the Dragon Mountain wildfire southeast of Quesnel (1,500 hectares), the Wildwood fire near the Williams Lake airport (2,000 hectares), the fire 10km northeast of Princeton (1,500 hectares), the Little Fort wildfires (900 hectares) and the blaze on the Ashcroft Reserve (4,400 hectares, zero per cent containment).
According to July 8 statistics from the B.C. Wildfire Service, 552 fires have occurred provincially in the current fiscal year —April 1, 2017 to April 31, 2018 — 86 of them in the Kamloops Fire Centre.
Fifty-two of those fires provincially have been lightning-caused, while another eight have been deemed to have been human-caused.
18,244 hectares of land has burned in the current fiscal year, 5,931 hectares of it in the Kamloops Fire Centre.
Skrepnek said the province had spent $46 million fighting wildfires this year as of the end-of-day Friday.
