Nearly a year after Abbotsford flooding, B.C. adds $41 million to recovery efforts

Ahead of the one year anniversary of British Columbia's devastating November floods, the government is investing more than $41 million into recovery efforts.

Public Safety Minister Mike Farnworth announced the additional funding while providing an update on recovery efforts in Abbotsford Thursday afternoon.

Wearing a white hard hat and high-visibility vest, Farnworth revealed more than 500 debris sites have been cleared so far, but said “there is more work underway to remove sediment, repair damaged dikes and river channels.”

The $41 million will go towards work on Sumas River, Clayburn Creek, Killgard Creek and Vedder Canal. Farnworth says more than $1.6 million is being reserved for permanent repairs to the Sumas Dike.

The minister said temporary repairs to the Sumas dike breach had allowed water to seep out onto farmland last summer.

“I was so scared when it was raining a week ago and the water was leaking over there," said blueberry farmer Satpal Sangha. "Now, they say they can fix (it)."

He said his fields were destroyed during the flood and he worries every time it rains.

The dike repairs are being handled by the City of Abbotsford and the Semá:th First Nation, and expected to be complete by the end of this month.

But some Sumas Prairie residents don’t feel enough is being done soon enough to prevent another flood.

Jenny Winkelhorst’s home flooded last November. She only got back in a couple of months ago.

“There’s not a day that goes by that we don’t think about what’s happened,” she said.

Winkelhorst believes there are some short-term solutions that could help prevent flooding, like cleaning out ditches on Sumas Prairie.

“They could be cleaned out just to hold that little bit more water,” she said.

Former Abbotsford Mayor Henry Braun said dredging those ditches requires various levels of government approval, as they are home to fish.

Speaking after Farnworth, Chief Dalton Silver commended the province for including Semá:th peoples in the recovery process.

“We've said before we haven't been as involved as we'd like to," Silver said. “I think the work we need to do needs to be done all together...I really do hope we can create a better place for our people in the future, and for the wildlife as well." 

More than 3,300 residents were forced from their homes when a series of atmospheric rivers caused the Nooksack River to overflow and flood areas of Abbotsford and the Sumas Valley. 

About 630,000 chickens, 12,000 hogs and 420 cattle died during the extreme weather events, which also washed out highways and caused landslides elsewhere in the Lower Mainland that killed five people.

After the waters cleared away, officials promised to find solutions to reduce flood risks for the Fraser Valley.

Earlier this week, Highway 8 – a key transportation route for several First Nations communities that was damaged in the same storms – was also reopened. 

The highway was damaged in 32 different areas during the storms, with a total of seven kilometres of the route washed away.

Next, Farnworth says the province is working on establishing a government structure that includes municipal, Indigenous, provincial, state and federal officials to address the ongoing risk of flooding due to climate change.

A Senate report earlier this month noted that more than 85 per cent of the dikes in the Lower Mainland were in less than fair condition.

With files from CTV News Vancouver's Ben Miljure and The Canadian Press