New measures are in place requiring municipalities and regional districts to designate fire inspectors, while putting some teeth into fire safety enforcement, via fines, thanks to the new Fire Safety Act.
A one-year transition began Aug. 1 and requires municipalities to designate fire inspectors and fire investigators and allows fines for not following fire safety orders.
The new act says that municipalities will follow a pro-active fire inspection model while regional (rural) districts will follow a complaint-driven model. As well, fire service advisers from the Office of the Fire Commissioner, will do fire safety inspections for regional districts, for no charge.
The FSA also introduces enhanced monitoring to identify higher-risk buildings, a penalty system to incentivize owner compliance with fire-safety legislation and better enforcement tools, said a release Aug. 1.
The process will create a single standard of fire safety in B.C., said Trish Mandewo, president of the Union of B.C. Municipalities.
However, the new act applies more to rural areas and means little change for Delta Fire and Emergency Services, or any other big city department, because that approach is already followed.
The department already has fire prevention officers and investigators,
said Dept. Chief Dave Wood.
“But as for Delta, it doesn’t change anything. We’re already meeting or exceeding all of those kinds of things,” Wood said.
Delta already has penalties it can enforce under city bylaws or its fire prevention division, but now the province has added another option as a backup, he added.
But Delta fire rarely issues fire safety tickets.
“Our bylaws are normally adhered to very well in Delta,” said Wood.
When they do issue a ticket for a fire safety violation, remedies are quickly made, and a second ticket isn’t needed.
“It’s very rare that people don’t comply with the fire code,” he said.
Delta Fire and Emergency inspects all public buildings once a year. The same goes for commercial and industrial buildings and strata complexes.
That works out to about 3,500 inspections a year.
Most inspections are not scheduled but businesses know they’ll be inspected annually.
“Most businesses are very welcoming, invite us in,” he said.
Wood noted that the wildfire danger rating in Delta is currently at moderate, and there could even be rain early next week.
But time is on the firefighters’ side as summer begins to wind down and nights get longer and cooler and temperatures after this weekend start to decrease.
“If we could get one more day of rain like we had a week and a half ago … then we’d be sitting really good.”
The weekend will be hot, but the fire danger rating should still stay at moderate, he added. “Knock on wood.”
