City Still Waits For Wildfire Funds

PRINCE GEORGE – Wildfire season is right around the corner, but the City of Prince George has yet to see any reimbursement for last year’s wildfire response. The City hosted over 10,000 evacuees from the Cariboo because of wildfires and the City says the bill for that effort is about $4.5 million.

“The receivable hasn’t been settled yet by the Province,” says Kris Dalio, the City Director of Finance. “It takes some time. They have, of course, the whole province to look after and audit processes to go through for every municipality before they release the funds. But, yeah, in the meantime, the municipality carries that.”

We asked if the City could manage a similar response with another wildfire. 

“We have reserves and we have surpluses that we can rely on for that,” explains Dalio. “Obviously, those aren’t infinite though and we need them for our own needs in the City. We would hope that it gets settled in a
reasonable time frame.”