By Troy Gillard (Twitter: @Troy_Gillard)

County gets grant funding for regional emergency response training

Jul 17, 2018 | 3:36 PM

Red Deer County is receiving a share of $2.6 million in provincial grants to coordinate and train regional “all-hazards” incident management teams to strengthen regional emergency response.

The province says in a release that these teams will use their expertise to support local officials when an emergency or disaster strikes. One of their main functions will be to centralize command, which enables more effective communication and resource sharing across municipal borders.

“We have learned a lot from previous disasters, and we know that fires and floods don’t stop at municipal lines, so it’s important that our ability to effectively respond to emergencies doesn’t stop there either,” Shaye Anderson, Minister of Municipal Affairs. “Our government is committed to helping regions pull together resources and expertise to better protect Alberta families and neighbours across communities.”

The grants will be rolled out over four years. Red Deer County is getting $160,000.

Others receiving funding include Canada Task Force 2 (City of Calgary), Town of High Level, City of Cold Lake, Capital Region and City of Medicine Hat.

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The province says the grant provides a stable source of funding, allowing the teams to conduct long-term planning and training. While the teams primarily support the regions where they are based, they may also be deployed to help other areas of the province.

In addition to helping fund the development of new regional teams, this investment includes support for Canada Task Force 2 (CAN-TF2), Calgary’s highly qualified incident management team. CAN-TF2 is a rapid-deployment and all-hazards Disaster Response Team with the ability to respond to disasters across Alberta and Canada. Its members are highly trained volunteers from a variety of specialties and include paramedics, doctors, firefighters, emergency managers and logistics specialists.

Investing in regional emergency teams is in direct response to lessons-learned reports from previous disasters. Report recommendations from the 2013 southern Alberta floods and the 2016 Wood Buffalo wildfires highlighted the importance of incident management teams and the value of regions working together to share emergency management resources.

(With file from Government of Alberta media release)