Jasper council hears providing temporary housing for all without homes not possible

Town council in Jasper, Alta., heard Tuesday it won’t be possible to secure temporary housing for everyone who lost their homes in a devastating wildfire in July.

The municipality estimates roughly 2,000 of the town’s 5,000 residents now have nowhere to live, as more than 800 housing units were destroyed in the fire.

“Housing was a challenge before the fire,” said Andy Esarte, the town of Canmore, Alta.’s engineering manager who is temporarily working with Jasper and Parks Canada’s Joint Recovery Co-ordination Centre.

“The idea that we can somehow create enough housing to address a significant portion of the current need in the next few months just isn’t realistic.”

Esarte told council the Joint Recovery Co-ordination Centre has been focused on securing housing for those deemed essential workers, such as hospital staff, but further options are being assessed for other key workers, like teachers ahead of schools reopening next week.

Alternatives include prefabricated housing, housing already available within Jasper and available housing in nearby communities such as Hinton, Alta., Esarte said.

Assessments of those options will be included in a proposal that will be submitted to the provincial government for funding consideration, he said.

“At this point, there’s no secured funding, and this is an important first step to determine the amount of funding that will be required,” Esarte said, adding that he will provide town council a summary of the proposal next week.

Since temporary housing has so far only been made available to those deemed essential workers, Coun. Wendy Hall said Tuesday she’s worried many displaced residents are “falling through the cracks.”

“We’re having long-term residents being told to go to shelters,” she said. “Losing your home and your job due to a wildfire, I don’t think that’s where you should be sent.”

“I’d probably argue that everyone’s essential to make up the fabric of our community, although I do know there are essential workers that we need in town to have a town.”

The municipality’s director of community development, Christopher Read, said the municipality’s outreach services department, which reopened on Monday, had 29 appointments on its first day, many of which were residents seeking housing-related assistance.

“We were definitely able to solve the bulk of those,” he said, adding staff were able to extend a few hotel room stays, set up apartment viewings in Edmonton and put up 11 families in Airbnbs that are being covered by the short-term rental company.

“Absolutely these are people that, up until yesterday, were slipping through for a variety of reasons.”

Read said since the department only reopened Monday, “we don’t really know what the scope of the demand is,” but information gathered from residents who make appointments over the next few days will also be included in the proposal being sent to the provincial government.

Besides a summary of the temporary housing proposal, Jasper’s council may also receive a report next week on what options the municipality has to mitigate the loss of an estimated $2.2 million in annual property tax revenue, as the fire wiped out more than $280 million in property value.

The Jasper fire is considered the second most expensive wildfire in Alberta’s history, behind the 2016 Fort McMurray fire.