Kamloops officials are using lessons both from the past and from other places to improve the city’s ability to respond quickly and effectively in the face of crisis.
A report to city council in May outlined the efforts underway in Kamloops to prepare for natural disasters and events of all kinds, from extreme temperatures to drought, floods, and fires.
In a memorandum, Emergency Services Manager Ty Helgason wrote the city is well aware of Kamloops’s position inside one of B.C.’s highest wildfire-risk geo-climatic zones, and is actively working to strengthen its readiness on multiple fronts ahead of the 2026 season.
The report notes that Kamloops benefits from having a BC Wildfire Service zone office within the city — an advantage most Interior communities do not have — providing ready access to ground and air resources and enabling ongoing joint training with Kamloops Fire Rescue.
The department also maintains a specialized structure protection trailer equipped with sprinkler systems designed to increase localized humidity around buildings and reduce the chance of ember ignition during a wildfire event.
On evacuation planning, officials are developing a city-wide framework that divides Kamloops into specific zones, each with its own operational playbook covering notification, movement of vulnerable residents, transit coordination, and links to regional partners.
The work gives priority to neighbourhoods with higher risk and limited access — the kinds of areas where confusion proved costly on the evening of the Juniper fire. The project is still in development.
Since 2021, the city has also paved three emergency access routes into Juniper Ridge, adding options that did not exist when residents jammed the single road out. Last year, it invited Juniper Ridge residents to take self-guided, escorted tours of those routes while conditions were calm — a deliberate effort to make the exit familiar before it becomes urgent.
The FireSmart program has grown steadily, Helgason noted. More than 265 home assessments were completed in 2025, driven in part by new financial incentives. The Community Fuel Reduction program provided rebates to residents who removed high-risk vegetation near their homes.
A new Home Improvement Rebate program offering up to $1,000 for fire-resistant roofing, siding, and venting launched this past March. The city, working with Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc and the BC Wildfire Service, completed an eight-acre prescribed burn in the Rose Hill area last year — fuel reduction work at the urban edge of one of the city’s higher-risk neighbourhoods.
As well, the city’s emergency notification system, Voyent Alert, sent more than 42,000 notifications to Kamloops residents in 2025. Registered users totalled 29,379 at year’s end, a 3.1 percent increase over 2024, though representing roughly 30 percent of the city’s total population.
The memo also notes the city completed an after-action review in early March of its host community operations from September 2025, when Kamloops took in residents displaced by fires elsewhere in the Interior. The final report is still in development, but its stated purpose — identifying strengths, gaps, and where service delivery can improve — reflects a practice the city has committed to after each major activation.
On the coordination side, emergency preparedness staff re-engaged the Social Response Task Force in spring 2026, a body facilitated by United Way BC that works to clarify roles between the social sector and Emergency Support Services during a crisis.
“The City continues to apply best practices learned from other jurisdictions that have experienced large‑scale disasters and complex recoveries,” Helgason noted in the memo.