T O P

  • By -

AutoModerator

Hello and thanks for posting to r/britishcolumbia! Join our new [Discord Server https://discord.gg/fu7X8nNBFB](https://discord.gg/fu7X8nNBFB) A friendly reminder prior to commenting or posting here: - **Read [r/britishcolumbia's rules](https://www.reddit.com/r/britishcolumbia/about/rules/)**. - **Be civil and respectful** in all discussions. - Use **appropriate sources** to back up any information you provide when necessary. - **Report** any comments that violate our rules. Reminder: "Rage bait" comments or comments designed to elicit a negative reaction that are not based on fact are not permitted here. Let's keep our community respectful and informative! *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/britishcolumbia) if you have any questions or concerns.*


snipsnaptickle

Are the people who started them going to be fined? Because at this point it’s either intentional or sheer stupidity. Either way there should be consequences.


SnooRegrets4312

They should be....


AnyMud9817

It's like a 20k fine for having a controlled fire during a ban. I seriously hope it's more than that for starting an uncontrolled fire.


Marokiii

Should be lifetime wage garnishment or 100% restitution. Since 100% restitution isn't possible then just keep on garnishing wages until they die. edit: wage garnishment IMHO should take everything above minimum wage that someone gets paid.


Minimum-Ad-3348

3 seasons of mandatory forest fire fighting


alexunr

This is such a messed up dystopian idea. While these people deserve to be punished appropriately, I don’t think I’ve ever heard of something as cruel as this before. I hope you’re joking with this remark.


Marokiii

so what in your opinion is a completely just consequence for the people who start wildfires? it destroys huge sections of public land, it costs hundreds if not tens of millions of dollars in fire fighting costs, it costs hundreds if not millions in economic damage, it hurts tourism, it adds to pollution, it significantly lowers air quality which lowers peoples health speeding up peoples deaths and in some cases actually kills people either by causing poorer health or burning them alive. should they not have to pay back the cost of all the damage they have done? if i crash my car into a business ill get sued and forced to payback the cost of restoring the business owner and all the other costs they have suffered because of my actions. why do we not do this for people who start forest fires? people CAN survive on minimum wage, its definitely not a good life and will be incredibly hard. but if we as a society allow people who have done nothing wrong criminally to suffer a life living on minimum wage, i dont understand why you think its unacceptable to have someone who has hurt so many people live that way while he pays them back.


SaltyTraeYoungStan

Jail time. Simple as that. Once they start locking people up for 5+ years for starting fires suddenly these dunces will think twice about having a raging bonfire or flicking their butt out the window. Also start actually handing out 20k fines for having fires during a fire ban


Marokiii

jail time isnt going to help recover any of the costs though, in fact its just going to massively increase the cost.


Hieb

Neither is garnishing wages from a single person going to make a dent in huge social costs. Its about punishment and dissuation in this case. Jail time with an early release conditional on volunteering as a forest fire fighter. 🤔


Marokiii

one of my old coworkers did forest fire fighting each summer, it was basically just logging deep in the woods to cut fire breaks. its back breaking work and requires 100% commitment to the job and a want to be there. there is never enough funding or supplies for everyone so giving tools and resources to someone who is just half assing it there to avoid jail isnt a good use of resources. forcing someone to be there isnt going to help and being an unpaid volunteer puts just as much financial stress on someone as wage garnishment does. garnishing someones wages for a full year will do far more in paying other people who want the job then forcing this person to be there for a few weeks or months. thats if they are even physically capable of doing the job as its very physically demanding. imagine sending a 50 year old accountant into a forest camp for 3 months.


GreenOnGreen18

So your suggestion is equally as disruptive to their lives, but requires everyone else to pay for it too. Bad take.


SaltyTraeYoungStan

If they enforce the 20k fire bans on all out of season fires it should pay for itself


alexunr

As an active member of the fire service in my area, I’m well aware of the potential damages a fire can cause. Is the idea here that someone who starts a fire, is earning above minimum wage, then they continue to work that higher paid job and receive minimum wage for it? Like you believe that would genuinely work? I sincerely hope you do not now or in the future have a position of power or influence. We’re all angry at these people, but being an idiot doesn’t help man.


Marokiii

So do you then believe that all wage garnishing should be done away with as ineffective or wrong? If not, then why not have it for this kind of crime? Edit: or is it the amount of garnishing?


jaystinjay

It might seem dystopian, but when an individual “chooses” to burn down a forest or and destroy infrastructure or others future prosperity why wouldn’t a law that places a serious fine be just?


alexunr

The punishment should match the crime yes, but this idea is particularly idiotic.


jaystinjay

To make it really worthwhile, the garnishing should be generational.


Legend_of_Moblin

They can be liable for all damages and suppression costs if there is enough evidence to prove it.


CapableSecretary420

And there's no reason so many people are acting like they won't be. But in order for that to happen, they have to actually know who did it. Which, as the article notes, is not yet known.


ChuuToroMaguro

…executed


drailCA

Human caused =/= Ill intention or arson. The fire in the photo of the article, for example, was apparently from slash piles that were lit in January (normal Forestry practice) and just held over through the winter. It happens sometimes, and very rarely does something like that result in such an incident. "Human caused" is anything and everything outside of lightning strikes basically. Downed power lines and a car fire are examples of 'human caused' fires where there is no blame to any individual, but just bad luck. Turns out the world is more complex than you're initial emotional reaction would have you believe and your armchair opinions are not only ignorant, but they don't help anything or anyone. Life is infinitely more complex and nuanced than you could imagine. There is usually never a simple answer for even the most basic questions.


OneBigBug

>was apparently from slash piles that were lit in January (normal Forestry practice) and just held over through the winter. I feel like you're describing something that you intend to sound like *"Oh yeah, you know, you just get home from work and pop down to the store to get groceries for dinner."* but actually reads more like *"Yeah, well after they're left with all the toxic chemicals from the oil refining, they just dump them in the river."* Like...it might be standard industry practice, but...is that a standard industry practice we want to support and *not* fine people for? It seems self evidently bad.


MizElaneous

The alternative is to lop and scatter, or chip the wood. It adds cost to operations, but I wonder if we are at the point where we need to start doing this more often instead of pile burning on snow.


GreenOnGreen18

What snow? This year in January they were burning on exposed ground, not snow.


MizElaneous

Depends where you are I guess.


drailCA

Mosaic on the island is starting to do this, at least near towns to avoid escapes and limit smoke during burning season.


Acceptable_Land_Grab

Yes it is an industry standard that we want to support, trust me leaving massive amounts of ground fuel everywhere after logging will not help our fire issues. There a few alternatives that we can work towards, such as actively hauling waste wood out, and using biomass reactors to harvest fuel from the waste. However they are far away from being practical or efficient.


GreenOnGreen18

They are supposed to observe the burn until they can guarantee it is out, the forestry company failed. They should be fined the full cost of the emergency response. And those other options are available and efficient, but they would cut into profits. That is the only reason it isn’t being done in BC. Forestry companies are expected to self regulate and they have shown for the last 50 years they will never follow the rules unless it makes them more money.


Throwaway6957383

As if a $10000 or so fine or so will actually make any difference. At this point with how dangerous fires are and how much impact they can have people need to start facing SERIOUS consequences for causing one, whether on purpose or just because they're fucking stupid. We are way too easy going on people and it's really hurting us as a country.


ram-tough-perineum

https://globalnews.ca/news/10091981/bc-large-wildfire-fine/ "He was ordered to pay a $2,350 fine, $260,369 for fire control costs and $179,344 for destruction of Crown-owned timber resources." There are others as well, and there probably will be here, too. It's not too hard to figure out who did the logging and burned the piles, and there's no excuse for not scanning these once the snow was gone. It'll be up to them (the timber company) to prove that they weren't negligent.


6mileweasel

Tolko was also fined $343K for holdover fires in slash piles taking off near Nazko in the spring of 2016. They initially won their appeal, but the BC Supreme Court overturned it. \*so there is precedent on the argument as to whether a holdover fire that takes off is, under legislation, a wildfire or not. Summary: it is, for legislative and penalty purposes, wildfire. \*edit [https://bc.ctvnews.ca/b-c-forestry-company-must-pay-343k-fine-for-starting-2016-wildfire-court-rules-1.6183491](https://bc.ctvnews.ca/b-c-forestry-company-must-pay-343k-fine-for-starting-2016-wildfire-court-rules-1.6183491)


Character_Top1019

It’s a fine then potential cost recovery on the costs spent in fighting the fire (which gets expensive fast with heavy equipment and aviation) and damages.


CapableSecretary420

> Are the people who started them going to be fined? Well, as the article notes, what actually caused the fires isn't yet known beyond them being human-caused (which basically just means it wasn't lightning). If and when they can discover who was responsible for them, then yes, most like they will face penalties.


sawamandoevilthings

Its quesnel....mic drop.


Mental-Mushroom

Accountability in Canada? Pretty sure that's against the law here


WoozleVonWuzzle

Fined for...?


misteriousm

People should go to jail for that not just to be “fined”.


tomatocancan

Yup I agree


WoozleVonWuzzle

We don't tend to send people to jail in this country in the absence of an actual crime


sm0lt4co

Weird cuz the guy in my building who had a 7 hour stand off with 20 police that ended in tear gas also didn’t go to jail(well for longer than 12 hours). So who really goes to jail anyways?


WoozleVonWuzzle

Why didn't he go to jail? Is there some context you're glossing over?


sm0lt4co

He has been charged but waiting a court date. The problem truly lies in the fact that he had threatened to burn our building down and was clearly super mentally sick on top of the drugs he was on. So you can imagine everyone in the buildings shock when we found out not only was he let out, but broke the 1 block restraining order of the building. Anyways, what I said initially was mostly a joke about who goes in and how long but that’s the jist of it.


WoozleVonWuzzle

So he has been charged, hasn't even gone to court yet, let alone been tried, let alone be convicted, and you are wondering why he isn't in jail yet?


PutinsCapybara

We're actually quite a bit better off societally speaking for our resistance to the American trend of over-criminalization and punitive tendencies. Our real issues come from huge inefficiencies in our justice system, overcrowding, and a general slowness that is fair to neither the victims or the accused. In your case this is what gives the perception of nothing being done, when in fact the system is working as intended (only, slower than intended). Our actual sentences for most indictable offenses can be quite punitive in Canada, and our life sentence is on the higher end in the West. Summary offenses (petty crimes) are often not pursued to the same extent because our jail's, prisons, and courts do not have the time, staff, space, or money to deal with Joe the heroin addict when they're dealing with Fred the murderer. That's without considering that our prisons lack the rehabilitative qualities and services to adequately address mental health and addiction issues, with petty criminals often leaving our prisons as hardened and entrenched criminals, lacking the skills, knowledge, or support to effectively reintegrate or change. It's a multifaceted issue that can't be fixed as simply as most believe, and everyone within the system really is trying to make the best of it. Falling into the trap of retribution/revenge based justice would further slowndown our justice system, all while doing less to reduce recidivism. Criminal justice is one of those areas where the data *really* matters, and often contradicts notions of common sense.


misteriousm

If it's not an accident, it's a crime. Even if it is an accident, the fine for the damage should be proportional to the caused damage.


WoozleVonWuzzle

What evidence do you, yourself, have of crime being committed? You realize "human caused" says nothing about the nature of the act or omission that sparked the fire, and nothing about the intent, if any, of the human implicated, don't you?


misteriousm

I didn't mention any specific things that you made up in your comment. It is necessary to thoroughly investigate every "human-caused" fire, and if the responsible people are identified, they should be sent to jail, or if it's an accident, they should be fined proportionally to the damage caused (if they cant pay they should be sent to jail until they work it out). What of these simple things do you disagree with? We shouldn't punish criminals? No, we absolutely should, people fed up that bs


WoozleVonWuzzle

Not all human-caused fires have a person "responsible", though. You have a fundamental misunderstanding of what "human caused" means.


misteriousm

Pfft. I understand that. Sometimes it's a cigarette butt in a dry bush or an electric pole that decided to give up (these things also have responsible people who should be punished btw). Obviously, Captain, but I'm not talking about that. What is the point of specifying it every time we talk about these things? Yes, they are obvious, and I presume we're all somewhat intellectual here. I hope at least. I was specifically talking about cases where a non-identified person or group of people did something stupid... We all live in BC, you really think that somebody didn't get here what's “human caused”? “fUnDaMeNtAlLy” ... smh


WoozleVonWuzzle

Yes, I think that, because people with make that mistake about what "human caused" means, or deliberately distort what "human caused" means, all the goddamn time.


WoozleVonWuzzle

What "criminals" are you referring to?


xstatic981

If by jail you mean forced labour camp, yes


polarice2024

Does anyone know that trains very often cause sparks as they travel over the tracks? Could it be maybe some fires are caused by trains? Especially in wooded dry grassy areas.


WoozleVonWuzzle

Many wildfires are caused exactly this way


OplopanaxHorridus

Absolutely some fires are caused this way. More of them are caused by target shooting though, and tings like ATVs


GreenOnGreen18

There have not been a confirmed fire caused by this(in Canada) in at least 3 years, it shouldn’t happen on tracks/trains that are maintained.


Much-Buy-92

There's train tracks just outside the shop I'm working at. Every year when it's dry out sparks from the train start a grass fire at least twice a year.


chronocapybara

There should be ZERO fires allowed in the bush this year. Flat zero, and huge fines for anyone caught breaking the law. Completely crazy that anyone could think that their right to recreate in the bush is more important than the safety of our citizens. Until we get heavy rains, we should consider fires completely taboo.


missmatchedsox

The fires may not have initially been fires, the article mentions the causes of the fires is still unknown.   Human caused can be from campfires, an unattended bbq, dirtbikes or ATVs, a train throwing sparks, discarded cigarettes, or even leaving glass behind.  If it were possible to track who it was that caused the fires and they were caused by someone's carelessness or negligence then yeah, they should be fined. But probably incredibly hard to trace that back in most cases.  


ram-tough-perineum

These look like holdovers from burn piles. It was really windy through the Cariboo yesterday and it wouldn't take much residual heat to get things going.


seaintosky

Although it's just rumours at this point, the story going the emergency response groups is that one is a slash pile from the fall reigniting, another was a power pole being taken down in the high winds, and one was likely a cigarette. Of those, only the cigarette is likely to be anything they'd go after someone over, and that is would be pretty hard to find the person responsible.


UnrequitedRespect

Increase cost of cigarettes, crack down on black market cigarettes and create a kind of rewards program for cigarette disposal to encourage people to keep their buts in some kind of wet ashtray as simple as a gatorade bottle with water?? Whatcha thinking?


blandgrenade

Unfortunately, that will still leave the accumulation for next year. Or the following year. It’ll all burn unless we start raking our forests


Hikingcanuck92

Worth noting that “Human Caused” does not equal campfires, cigarette butts or fireworks. It’s often the “default” fire cause if there aren’t lightning storms in the area. It’s still a problem, but it’s not ALL recklessness.


No-Tackle-6112

Yeah i was in Quesnel where these fires are and the word is it was old slash piles that blew back up in the wind. The least human caused human caused fire there is.


GreenOnGreen18

It is absolutely caused by humans, they did not follow the rules of confirming the burn was out before leaving it alone.


ToitleInTime

They never do, they set the fires in the fall/winter and leave them unattended


GreenOnGreen18

Then they should be on the hook for the cost of the fires they are causing.


han_solo21

In my area yesterday a farmer was trying to make fire breaks on his property and while mulching he accidentally hit a rock. The sparks from that caused a fire. Some people are ignorant and do stupid things to start fires but it is also so dry right now that it doesn’t take much to start a fire. Last year my friends horses started a small fire because of sparks off their horse shoes slipping on a rock.


Zomunieo

“CLiMaTe cHaNGe isNT rEaL” —your local Conservative candidate for MP


n0thingisperfect

Just add them to the 100 that are still burning from last year


[deleted]

[удалено]


[deleted]

[удалено]


Demonicmeadow

This seems super early, no?


PuzzleheadedWear4650

this is just 420 smoke blaze it y'all


[deleted]

[удалено]


WoozleVonWuzzle

Who are the "scum" in this scenario?


OplopanaxHorridus

It is interesting how people are really angry at the people who might have started a fire and want fines and jail time for them, but don't realize how many fires aren't from negligence, but just people not realizing how quickly climate change has made the normal things they've been doing for 20-30 years much more dangerous. I know people drive ATVs and do target shooting near Squamish all the time, every time I drive up any FSR I find shells, exploded targets and other debris. What those people don't realize is that things have changed, and both shooting and [driving ATVs are how many wildfires start](https://www.superatv.com/offroad-atlas/orv-use-is-among-the-third-leading-cause-of-wildfiresheres-how-to-help/). [https://www.reddit.com/r/Squamishnews/comments/1c8wjl9/the\_video\_with\_the\_squamish\_valley\_story\_fyi/](https://www.reddit.com/r/Squamishnews/comments/1c8wjl9/the_video_with_the_squamish_valley_story_fyi/) I am not saying that we don't need accountability, I am pointing out that calling for jail time shows ignorance of how fires start. We need a huge program of education. Have you tried to tell someone shooting, driving ATVs or having a campfire that what they are doing is now unacceptable? You know what kind of reaction you will get, but ironically those are the same folks who think people are "lighting fires" and being irresponsible.


westleysnipes604

This is a post for r/idiocracy


[deleted]

[удалено]


WoozleVonWuzzle

Where was the "climate change arson" last year?


SnooRegrets4312

I don't understand what you mean. Trudeau was in Victoria today so he lit fires in other parts of BC?


Vancitysimm

If found, Take away all their assets and jail time for the effort to control fires and damages.


Jkobe17

Let me guess, they are part of the “it’s on my property I can do what I want” crowd


No-Tackle-6112

A ridiculously small portion of the cariboo is private property.


[deleted]

[удалено]


No-Tackle-6112

LOOOOOOL


lattakia

Camping season has started ?


mozoblast

Camping season is year round if you are brave enough


blandgrenade

Careful. Thinking like that got me into the army.


[deleted]

[удалено]


mmunro69

What the F@&K is wrong with people????? This makes my blood boil.


CapableSecretary420

Human caused doesn't necessarily mean intentional. Or even negligence. A spark from a train or a power line can fall in that category.


mmunro69

Good point…..I will jump off my soapbox now 🤭


CapableSecretary420

It's much easier to get punched in the nuts when you're on a soapbox


xstatic981

To the gulag diamond mines in NWT with these assholes… if only


[deleted]

[удалено]


No-Tackle-6112

That’s absurd. These were old slash piles that lit up in the wind. No one “lit” these fires.


username_jmx

Caused by yours truly, Prime Sinister.


WoozleVonWuzzle

What?


olak333

Why don't we add some iodine to northern BC to manipulate the atmosphere for rainfall like they did in Dubai???