More disaster response work straining Calgary's emergency resources

The head of the Calgary Emergency Management Agency (CEMA) said a growing number of emergency situations is putting a strain on the City of Calgary's resources — and its employees.

CEMA chief Sue Henry told city council's emergency management committee Thursday that the emergency operations centre (EOC) has already been open 76 days in 2024.

That compares to 54 days in 2023 and just eight days in 2022.

The key events this year that prompted the underground, high security centre to open included the unexpected rupture of the Bearspaw South feeder main in June, and the influx of evacuees fleeing a wildfire that swept through Jasper in July.

When the municipal emergency plan is activated, officials from the city as well as private utility operators gather at the EOC to coordinate the response to any situation.

Once the centre is opened, it remains in operation 24 hours per day and sometimes for extended periods.

Henry said this places a strain on staff who are diverted from their regular work and then must work long hours in stressful situations.

"It does have a human toll and we need to make sure that we're doing the appropriate mental health wellness programs for our staff — before, during and after an event," said the chief.

Long-running emergencies also boosts staff overtime costs for city employees.

"The new normal of increasing disaster trends is changing our operations, increasing service risks and impacting the City of Calgary," said Henry.

For that reason, she told the committee an evaluation is being done to assess whether council needs to allocate more money to help cover the costs of the growing number of emergencies that the city is being forced to respond to, including more hours of operation for the EOC.

Henry said the city can recover some of its costs from other governments. For example, in the past two years the city has hosted evacuees fleeing wildfires threatening Jasper and Yellowknife N.W.T.

A review is also underway on the city's municipal emergency plan.

A member of the council committee, Coun. Gian-Carlo Carra, said he would like all of council to discuss resources and support for emergency officials.

"We're hearing you loud and clear. There's a lot of work you have to do to talk about whether keeping on keeping on is the right way to go, or changing the model is the right way to go, and that will definitely have budgetary implications," said Carra.

The chair of the committee, Coun. Courtney Walcott, pointed out that in addition to the emergency situations that seem to be happening with more regularity, the COVID-19 pandemic was a unique situation for the EOC.

While there may not have been 24/7 operations at the EOC for the entirety of the pandemic from 2020 to 2022, it was essentially open most days in each of those years after COVID-19 reached Calgary in March 2020.

"For the last essentially five years, EOC's been running on all cylinders in some way or another," said Walcott.

"We don't want that to be the new normal. We have to be prepared if it is the new normal. But we don't want that to be the new normal."

City council as a whole will be briefed on the emergency response concerns at a meeting next month.