Photo: Councillors heard those reports from Director of Emergency Management David Mohl, who began his emergency management report with an audit update. Screenshot

The Town of Hanna council heard emergency management and fire department updates that suggest those services are preparing for the possibility of wildfires. The reports were made at the May 12 regular meeting of council.

Councillors heard the reports from Director of Emergency Management David Mohl, who began his emergency management report with an audit update. “Completed our required 2026 audit with one of the Alberta Emergency Management field officers in Hanna and reviewed our municipal emergency management plan,” stated Mohl in his report to council.

He expanded verbally by saying, “Did our audit for this start of the year. I don’t know why they were trying to complete audits before the first quarter, but the government was."

“So, got through that pretty much unscathed.”

He went on to report mock exercises are coming up soon. “Attended multiple meetings, along with Special Areas, with Trace Associates, which is a company that Special Areas has hired to plan and facilitate an upcoming tabletop exercise in Hanna in May as well as a full functional exercise in Oyen in June,” stated Mohl’s report to council.

He added verbally that Special Areas has taken the lead on disaster exercises. “Just been busy with Special Areas,” said Mohl. “They’ve done an RFP (request for proposal) for a company to host a couple of table and functional exercises.”

Mohl explained the planning committee for these exercises has the events coming up soon, and the full functional exercise scheduled in Oyen in June has been planned for years.

As councillors discussed emergency preparedness, Mohl observed that preparing for wildfires in the Special Areas is much different than, for example, preparing for wildfires in a forested region. He observed that past fires that occurred in forests might travel a certain distance in nine hours, but a similar fire in grasslands like the Special Areas can travel the same distance in one hour.

Mohl noted that the way wildfires move can be affected by how crops are planted; he noted there used to be a lot of summer fallow.

“Now it’s all continuous crop,” he said. “So we get that risk more in the fall.”

Mohl noted the Hanna area is currently experiencing high winds that dry out the countryside, and he’d like to see the fields “green up” a bit.

As he ended that report, the discussion moved to a regional approach to emergency management and how many communities work together to reduce risk and handle emergencies.

Fire report

Mohl also gave councillors his regular Hanna Fire Department update.

“We’ve been slightly busier,” he said. “We’ve had 26 incidents up to the end of March, which was five up from the previous year.”

He reported the Hanna department currently has 26 members and several candidates are currently being interviewed.

He observed that recently, during Emergency Preparedness Week, the Hanna department hosted many students from Prairieland Regional Division schools, with the students seeming to really enjoy fire department tours and demonstrations.

Councillors accepted Mohl’s report as information.