Jobs, Tourism and Innovation Minister Pat Bell has been named the lead on the B.C. government's effort to help Burns Lake get back on its economic feet following the explosion and fire that destroyed the town's main employer.
Bell said he will be in the community of 3,600 people 226 kilometres west of Prince George on Friday to meet with local community leaders and organizations.
"My role on behalf of cabinet will be to go in there, figure out what the key things are that we need to do both in the short term, the mid-range and the long term to see the community recover," Bell said Tuesday.
"Undoubtedly, that will require some initial work on finding ways to [replace] employment for people in the community, in the mid-term working with [mill owner] Hampton to see if there is an opportunity to rebuild the mill and then over the long-term looking for more diversification in the community so it doesn't suffer from the risks that are exposed to a community when there is only a single primary employer."
Nechako Lakes MLA John Rustad will still remain involved, Bell added, "but it's important to have a cabinet representative, as well, and that will be my role."
Most of Babine Forest Products was destroyed when an explosion ripped through the sawmill on Friday evening.
Two workers were killed and 19 were sent to hospital with varying injuries.
The mill employed 250 people, making it the community's largest employer.
A "rapid response team" from Victoria has also been formed to work on economic recovery efforts, and Bell, the MLA for Prince George-Mackenzie, will announce shortly who will lead it.
The team will work with the Regional District of Bulkley-Nechako, the Village of Burns Lake, the Burns Lake Native Development Corp. and others to provide economic development and community transition expertise as part of the local response effort.
Public Safety Minister Shirley Bond, the MLA for Prince George-Valemount, is co-ordinating emergency services for the community and WorkSafeBC is at the site to provide guidance for injured workers and investigating the incident, the B.C.
government said in a statement.
In Prince George, Central Interior Logging Association president Mary Anne Arcand has been "working the phones" to line up jobs for equipment operators, truckers and contractors who've lost work because of the disaster.
"I sent out an e-mail yesterday and we've got 56 jobs already," Arcand said Tuesday.
As many as 500 truck drivers, equipment operators and contractors will be affected and many make about 80 per cent of their income in the first three months of the year before activity is slowed by break-up as the ground thaws at the end of winter, Arcand said.
But she also said activity is so high in the rest of the province that most should find work.
"We can absorb them in the harvesting sector in the north here because we need the people but when I talked to a couple guys yesterday I said 'how soon can you go?' and they're going 'well, come on Mary Anne, everyone's walking around here in a complete daze, we need to be here with our families and stuff.'"
"So the idea of shipping the whole crew down to Chase or to Fort St. James or Mackenzie is a little [tough], so we've got to give them that time.
"But the clock keeps ticking and the winter keeps going so they'll have to make some decisions. I'm thinking by Monday next week we'll see most of those guys working somewhere."
