The N.W.T. government has backtracked on a statement made Monday that Yellowknife evacuees who left the city on their own would not be reimbursed for their travel expenses.
During Tuesday night’s wildfire press conference, Finance Minister Caroline Wawzonek clarified that while official supports are not yet available, her department is working to make funding available.
“We’re going to have to figure this out. People won’t be able to get back. They don’t have some funding in many cases,” she told reporters.
On Monday, Jennifer Young, director of corporate affairs for the department of municipal and community affairs, said while evacuees who were supported by the Emergency Management Organization (EMO) would have that same support when re-entering the territory, that wouldn’t be the case for those who left on their own, such as by car.
In fact, Yellowknife evacuees and others who left the N.W.T would be expected to cover their own expenses.
“If you self-evacuated on your own means, the expectation will be that you re-enter under your own needs as well,” she said.
She noted evacuees who found their own accommodations outside of what the N.W.T. government is offering also would not be entitled to reimbursement.
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Instead, she suggested evacuees check their insurance policies.
Young’s comments seemingly went against the N.W.T.’s Aug. 16 evacuation order which asked Yellowknife residents to leave the city by car if they were able to.
The news sparked outrage on social media, with some sharing a screenshot of a CBC article decrying the lack of financial assistance.
That includes Francis Thrasher, who is of Inuvialuit and Gwich’in descent.
Thrasher self-evacuated with his partner and five children on Thursday. The family is now staying in a hotel in Edmonton with financial support from the Red Cross.
Thrasher said he’s spent around $2,000 in expenses since evacuating and was shocked and frustrated to hear families like his wouldn’t be financially supported.
“The city instructed us and told us to leave against our will for the better of us, for the safety of us. They’re responsible for the wording of telling us to leave,” he said.
“Now we’re seeing that they refuse to provide us assistance to come back home when they are the ones who told us to leave. It’s their responsibility theirs.”
MLA ‘appalled’
The news also surprised MLA Katrina Nokleby who said she was “appalled” to hear self-evacuees wouldn’t be supported.
She said she’s been encouraging evacuees to keep receipts so they can be reimbursed at a later date.
“They did no planning and now they’re telling people they’re on the financial hook for it and looking for the federal government to bail ’em out,” she said.
“What this government should have said (is), ‘we will take care of you and we will figure out how we pay for it later.’ To put this emotional stress on the people that have already been suffering through years now of forest fires, floods and COVID isolation. This is actually, to me, negligent.”
Nokleby added she’s heard of reports of professionals and healthcare workers being treated unkindly while evacuating, and with the government not having an initial plan in place to provide financial support to self-evacuees, she feels there will be an exodus of much-needed employees.
“Do you think any of them are going to come back? We are going to lose a huge amount of people that we need,” she said.
Monday’s comments sparked the MLA to write to Premier Caroline Cochrane about her concerns.
“(I said) this is inappropriate. You forced people out, you told them to go, and now you’re going to tell them that they have to pay for it all.”
No one saying ‘no’
But during Tuesday night’s wildfire update, Wawzonek said her government was aware of the challenges evacuees are facing and support would be available.
She noted the territory is grappling with an unprecedented situation.
“The programs that we have set up for natural disaster evacuations, of which we’ve sadly had too many in the last couple years, they are not designed to deal with the kind of situation that we’re in,” she said.
While Wawzonek said she doesn’t have an answer for what financial relief will look like for self-evacuees, she said “policies and guidelines are under consideration.”
“The messaging here is no one is saying ‘no.’ We’re saying let’s do some policy work so we can figure out what a good option is.”
Young, who also spoke at the update, clarified the evacuation order was written with the focus of evacuating thousands of people.
“It was really meant to look at different ways we could do that, given we could only access so many assets in a short time frame,” she said.
As for Thrasher, he’s hoping for financial assistance like an emergency relief fund or a system similar to CERB.
He also wants more transparency about the evacuation plan and for displaced families like his own.
“(Yellowknife is our) home and we’re going to come back and N.W.T. government is going to have answer to all of us,” he said.
