B.C. planning new disaster management laws, Ma says at UBCM [Video]

Vancouver –

British Columbia’s emergency management minister said the province will be ready to introduce “in the coming weeks” new laws to govern responses to increasingly frequent natural disasters such as wildfires and flooding.

Bowinn Ma told a gathering at the Union of B.C. Municipalities’ annual convention in Vancouver Tuesday that laws will address the four phases of emergency management, ranging from preparedness and mitigation to response and recovery.

Ma told B.C.’s local politicians that the current Emergency Program Act focusing on disaster response has not been updated since 1993 and hasn’t kept up with the increasing frequency of extreme weather brought on by climate change.

Also at the convention, health and weather officials warned B.C. communities that the higher frequency and size of wildfires in recent years will likely continue or get even worse, with the resulting smoke carrying long-term impacts on people’s health.

B.C. Health Minister Adrian Dix said the …