Saturday June 20, 2026 | LANGFORD, BC
Notes on safety | by Mary P Brooke | Island Social Trends
Smokers should not be tossing lit or smouldering cigarette butts into garden beds or mulch in the City of Langford. Or anywhere.
The lovely garden bedding and mulch presentation next to the Royal Roads University (RRU) downtown campus now has a “don’t toss butts” sign in the mulch, as a reminder.
The sign reads: “A preventable fire was started here. Bark mulch and cigarette butts don’t mix. Please use an ashtray or a reusable pocket ashtray.”
That particular fire happened on June 18. It was called in by a passer-by at 8:10 am, says Simon Chadwick, Assistant Chief, Fire Prevention and Inspection, Langford Fire Rescue.
In addition to being dangerous, tossing butts into nice landscaping in a highly populated urban area is disrespectful on many levels not the least of which is using up costly fire department resources but also the safety of fellow residents and visitors in the city.
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