Williams Lake suffering through labour shortage due to wildfires

Jan 5, 2018 | 9:24 AM

KAMLOOPS — Some fairly serious labour pains are being felt in Williams Lake following last summer’s devastating wildfires.

The fires forced the evacuation of the entire town in July for weeks and according to Mayor Walt Cobb, a recent labour survey conducted by the local chamber of commerce reveals a lot of people haven’t returned home yet.

“Aparently a number of people have not come back,” he says. “Now, those are people that didn’t have homes here, they were probably renting, they were doing different things. But yes, they figure there could up be up to possibly 1,000 people. I don’t know if it’s that high or not, that sounds high. But that would be eight to 12 per cent of our population.”

He says the shortage has affected mainly the service sector, where Walmart for example is short 50 employees. But Cobb says even some of the mills in town – which pay far higher than minimum wage – are facing a bit of a pinch.

“So, anybody looking for work right now and wants to come to Williams Lake there’s job postings all over the place for all sorts of jobs. Actually our economic development officer is going to different places where they have job fairs and is going to take business cards from the people in Williams Lake looking for employees.”

And then there’s the psychological effect the fires are still having on people.

“We’re hearing from teachers that kids are having anxiety attacks about having to leave home. The doctors are seeing professionals having stress issues they feel are being caused by the impacts of the fires and the evacuations too.”

As a result, Cobb says the City is working with the Red Cross and mental health professionals to get as many people as possible the services they need.

Does he feel senior levels of government have done all they can to help assist?

“So far we’ve gottten all we need. This week the federal government has put $175 million towards wildfire affected areas. With donations from the Red Cross, the money should be there.”