COLD LAKE – After another summer of severe weather and power outages, a Cold Lake resident is asking a simple question: When the power, internet and cell data go down, where are residents supposed to turn for reliable information?

That question led to an extended discussion about emergency preparedness during Cold Lake City Council’s Aug. 11 meeting, with administration defending the City’s level of readiness while acknowledging there may be an opportunity to better explain its emergency plans to the public.

The discussion came during public question period, when a resident raised concerns about emergency communication following a recent major windstorm and power outage.

“What tool was the City using to communicate with its residents with the most recent power failure and where should I look?” the resident asked. “The radios didn’t work. My internet didn’t work. I had no data. Where should I look in the future at the next power failure?”

He pointed out that power outages are no longer hypothetical scenarios for Cold Lake, particularly as the City itself has raised concerns with ATCO Electric about the frequency and reliability of outages.

“They’re not what-ifs. They’re happening,” he said.

City says response depends on the emergency

City officials stressed throughout the discussion that no single answer applies to every emergency.

CAO Kevin Nagoya explained that emergency management plans need to remain flexible because the location, severity and type of emergency determine what resources can safely be used.

“You have to first understand what it is and how big you have to be in order to manage the plan,” Nagoya said, explaining that the City then determines which communication tools and resources are appropriate for that particular incident.

That includes decisions about where residents should go.

Nagoya cautioned against telling residents ahead of time that one particular municipal facility will always serve as an emergency centre.

“If you educate your entire community, everybody under state of a local emergency, please head to the Energy Centre, and the Energy Centre blew up — you shouldn’t pre-educate your community to go to the Energy Centre,” he said.

“It has to be based on what the incident is, what available assets that you have.”

There has already been a real-world example.

During a winter power outage, council heard the Cold Lake Energy Centre itself was without power. Administration said the City had alternative locations identified in case warming centres were needed later in the outage.

Those locations weren’t immediately announced because they first needed to be prepared and staffed before residents could be directed there.

What happens when the internet goes down?

The resident continued to press council on how people are supposed to receive information when the tools normally used by the City aren’t available.

Administration pointed to a previous eight-hour winter outage when Cold Lake’s Emergency Operations Centre was operating and Facebook was used extensively to communicate information.

For more routine outages, however, residents should first look to the utility provider.

Emergency management staff told council that ATCO is the primary source for information about an electrical outage, because the City relies on the utility for information about the problem, affected area and anticipated restoration.

“If ATCO is not able to provide that, we are not able to provide you any information,” administration explained.

City officials acknowledged that internet availability can itself become a problem during emergencies.

Council discussed the difficulty of developing multiple competing alert systems, noting that emergency messaging needs to be consistent and that too many alerts can desensitize people to warnings.

Cold Lake scores high for emergency readiness

While the questions exposed some challenges in public communication, administration emphasized that Cold Lake’s emergency planning is regularly reviewed by the province.

Nagoya told council the City scored approximately 98 percent for readiness during its most recent provincial audit, putting Cold Lake among the highest-rated municipalities for emergency preparedness.

“Cold Lake is one of the highest in terms of state of readiness,” Nagoya said.

City staff and council members also receive Incident Command System training at various levels, while Cold Lake maintains an Emergency Operations Centre that can be activated when required.

Administration stressed that not every power outage automatically becomes a municipal emergency.

The severity, duration, weather conditions and potential risk to public safety all factor into the City’s response. A three-hour summer outage, for example, could require a very different response than an eight-hour outage during extreme winter temperatures.

Emergency plan to be available to residents

One tangible outcome from the discussion was clarification around what residents can actually see before an emergency happens.

Nagoya confirmed Cold Lake has a Community Emergency Management Plan that is intended to be publicly available.

“We have a Community Emergency Management Plan that is a public-facing document,” he said.

Administration said it would check whether the document is currently available on the City’s website and, if it isn’t, ensure it is published.

There is also a second set of operational emergency plans used internally by the City that are not public.

The resident was also invited to provide his detailed concerns to the City for further answers, while administration indicated the recent outage and issues raised could be brought forward at a future emergency management meeting.

The discussion comes as Cold Lake is separately pressing ATCO Electric to examine the reliability of the city’s electrical grid following a series of significant outages.

For residents, the Aug. 11 conversation ultimately highlighted two different issues: how prepared the City is to respond to an emergency and how effectively residents know what to do when one happens.