Five B.C. mayors join forces to advocate for federal support

Highlighting the challenges after the 2021 atmospheric river, Merritt Mayor Mike Goetz called the Merritt-to-Abbotsford connection the ‘weak link’ in Canada’s connectivity.

“Abbotsford has now flooded twice in four years, cutting off all trade for several days and several weeks in some aspects,” Goetz told CFJC News. “When we saw the flood in 2021 the pipeline was actual exposed, that had to be shutdown until that was taken care of, we lost bridges. We understand as mayors that a healthy trade corridor is needed, but right now, you are only as strong as your weakest link, and the weakest link happens to be this end of the country where atmospheric rivers can change how the economy and trade and everything works.”

The hope is by moving forward as a group of five mayors and communities, the entire region can be strengthened, helping ensure supply chain resilience in the face of climate related disasters.

“The feds they denied our DMAF (Disaster Mitigation and Adaptation Funding), they denied Princeton’s DMAF and they denied Abbotsford’s DMAF, very unfortunate,” said Goetz. “None of us have seen any funding, so the proposition here is we go as a group, we work as a group and it’s all for one and one for all. It’s not just pick one of us and get it all done – we all need the same thing. And what we need is we need protection – we need dikes done correctly. We have to be able to keep these corridors open and we have got to be able to make sure that people in these communities are safe.”

by Michael Reeve

Five B.C. mayors join forces to advocate for federal support

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