Premier Danielle Smith paid homage to the firefighters for the work they did in fighting the devastating Jasper National Park forest fire and subtly suggested that a review of federal policies is necessary to prevent similar situations from happening again.
The massive fire that started on July 22 in Jasper National Park, which is managed by Parks Canada, has drawn scrutiny over the number of prescribed burns conducted, with the federal government remaining vague on specifics.
Asked for her thoughts on the criticism towards Parks Canada, Premier Smith was careful not to politicize the fire, which resulted in the evacuation of over 20,000 people, including 5,000 residents, and burned down 30% of the town of Jasper’s structures.
“We have to pay attention to what the scientists are telling us,” Smith said, pointing to the fact that some experts have warned about the effects of pine beetles, which has killed a number of the trees making them standing matchsticks, on top of what’s already an aged forest.
“And so when you have forests that are 80 or 100 years old, there’s only a few things that’s going to happen. You either mechanically remove that fuel or you do prescribed burns to remove that fuel or nature will remove that fuel for you,” she said.
Smith said that Alberta is reviewing its own forest management practices on crown lands, with Todd Loewen tasked with developing better strategies for fuel management.
She further indicated that the provincial and federal governments have agreed to a unified command approach for managing the current crisis and future recovery efforts.
“And I think that’s going to include us asking some of those hard questions about what do we do to make sure that the fuel is removed in a way that makes sense for the age of the forest,” Smith said.
Smith praised the efforts of the firefighters, some of whom, despite losing their own homes, continued working to protect lives and property.
Her comments come a day after the federal Liberals’ Environment Minister, Steven Guilbeault, who Smith regularly says should be fired, defended their handling of forest fires in Jasper National Park. Guilbeault said that prescribed burns have been conducted for years, but failed to provide specifics on frequency, the number of burns in the past five years, or the total area covered.
