WHEREAS the tanker truck incident on April 16, 2011 in Goldstream Park on Highway 1 the Trans Canada Highway resulted in the complete closure of this highway for approximately twenty-four hours, and necessitated the response of four fire rescue services and one hazardous materials unit, the District of Sooke being one of them; AND WHEREAS the resulting administrative setup provided significant challenges for response team members in terms of being reimbursed financially: THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that UBCM call on the Insurance Corporation of British Columbia and other agencies or provincial ministries as needed, with regard to facilitating the reimbursement process for volunteer and career fire rescue services across British Columbia in a timely manner.
Ministry of Environment There are approximately 3,500 hazardous material incidents reported across British Columbia each year. The BC Ministry of Environment is the lead provincial ministry responsible for provincial preparedness and response management for spills of oils and hazardous materials. Fire Departments are able to recover reasonable costs when responding to a hazardous materials incident outside of their local government responsibility when they are under the direction of a Ministry of Environment Environmental Emergency Response Officer. Please contact the Environmental Emergency Program at 250 387-9955 for a guidance document that provides further clarification. Local governments are strongly encouraged to develop their own cost recovery bylaws to enable them to directly recover the costs they incur from the responsible party. The Ministry of Environment is currently reviewing industry response capability and capacity requirements which may lead to additional requirements for industry to ensure they are able to manage and respond to their incidents this may help reduce local government response costs.
ICBC With respect to resolution B5 - Local Government Emergency Response Costs, ICBC collects premiums for expected claims based on what our customers are legally liable to pay, should they be responsible for a crash. To the extent that the premium for Optional insurance considers fire department charges, the premium accounts for situations in which our customers are travelling in jurisdictions where there is a legal obligation to pay for fire department charges. As there is no legal obligation for motorists to pay for fire department charges within BC, ICBC does not collect premiums, either through Basic or Optional insurance, to cover these charges. If the legislation were changed to make BC motorists responsible for fire department charges under Basic insurance, ICBC may require an increase to the Basic insurance rate. Basic insurance rates are regulated by the British Columbia Utilities Commission and any change requires their approval. ICBC contributes to municipalities and municipal services through annual grants in lieu of taxes. Thirty-one cities, districts, and municipalities received approximately 4.3 million in 2010. ICBC also supports communities through its loss prevention and road safety programs, including partnerships involving local road improvements. In 2010, ICBC invested approximately 46 million in road safety.