Wednesday June 25, 2025 | LANGFORD, BC [Updated June 26, 2025]
by Mary P Brooke | Island Social Trends
The City of Langford now has a Community Wildfire Resiliency Plan. It was approved at the June 16, 2025 meeting of Council.
The City of Langford’s Community Wildfire Protection Plan (CWPP), originally developed in 2020, has been revised and updated to a Community Wildfire Resiliency Plan (CWRP).
This update was funded by the FireSmart Community Funding and Supports grant from the Union of BC Municipalities, which is part of the Province’s Community Resiliency Investment Program.
“The Community Wildfire Resiliency Plan will strengthen Langford into a resilient and FireSmart community, reducing the dangers of interface fires and keeping our residents safe,” it was stated by the City this week.
The consultant for the plan update was Diamond Head Consulting Ltd of Vancouver.
Long-range vision:
Work on wildfire resiliency has been in the works under the leadership of Langford Fire Chief Chris Aubrey since at least 2019 including an interface issues open house in 2019.
“Each summer we see an increasing number and size of devastating wildfires all over the world,” says Chief Aubrey.
“Fires on the scale we have never seen before — such as Maui, Los Angeles and Jasper — that will take decades to recover from,” said Langford’s Fire Chief this week.
“By updating to a Community Wildfire Resiliency Plan, Langford is taking action to mitigate this treat to our community and to work with our residents and community partners to build resiliency into our neighbourhoods and homes,” Chief Aubrey told Island Social Trends this week.
By developing a Community Wildfire Protection Plan, Langford will continue to qualify for additional funding opportunities through the FCFS program for wildfire mitigation efforts.
Wildfire risks in Langford:
The CWRP represents a new generation of strategies aimed at reducing wildfire risks in Langford.
- It incorporates FireSmart principles and will serve as the primary framework for wildfire risk reduction.
- The Plan builds on the successful components of the Community Wildfire Protection Plan while introducing new elements that align more closely with the seven FireSmart disciplines.
33 initiatives:
The updated Plan prioritizes 33 initiatives including:
- maintaining a dedicated FireSmart and Wildfire Resiliency position,
- conducting FireSmart assessments of critical infrastructure and community assets and
- developing mitigation strategies in priority neighbourhoods.
Other key recommendations include:
- updating development processes to include fire and emergency input,
- supporting firefighter training, and
- advancing vegetation management in parks and green spaces.
Environment, protected areas and parks:
Langford contains extensive areas of natural vegetation on public and private property. Green spaces in the City provide important habitats for native wildlife, produce ecosystem services, and often have high recreational value and visitation.
About 5% of Langford’s land base is comprised of municipal parks. The total area of City parks is 200 ha, though most are only a few hectares in size. City parks often contain small areas of native forest, but also include community and neighbourhood parks that are fully landscaped.
City parks are a small portion of the City’s overall parkland (almost 1,000 ha in total), which includes extensive areas managed by the CRD in Mount Wells, Sooke Hills Wilderness, Mill Hill, and Thetis Lake Regional Parks as well as Goldstream Provincial Park. These regional and provincial parks are predominantly maintained as natural ecosystems, though all feature recreational walking and biking trails, picnic areas, and other park facilities.
Parkland areas play important roles in protecting critical habitat for salmon-spawning and federally listed species, as well as at-risk species and ecological communities.
Wildfire in Langford’s forested parks could result in the loss of recreation and social values and require costly clean-up and restoration.
The City can lead vegetation management to reduce wildfire risk in municipal parks but must partner with the CRD or BC Parks to advance any fuel management in their park properties. Opportunities for fuel management in parks are discussed in the Vegetation Management section of the report.
Focus on public safety:
“Langford’s Strategic Plan outlines a vision for six priority areas, including quality of life with a focus on public safety,” says Langford Mayor Scott Goodmanson.
“The Community Wildfire Resiliency Plan will be crucial in helping residents prepare for wildfire challenges and improving overall community safety.”
FireSmart BC:
By approving the completed CWRP, Council has directed Langford fire rescue staff to prioritize and implement its recommendations to reduce wildfire risk in Langford.
The City’s local FireSmart program aims to increase community awareness and resilience against wildfires through ongoing education on wildfire mitigation for residents.
The City of Langford encourages residents book a free FireSmart Home Assessment to learn how to increase their home’s resiliency to wildfire and access helpful tools like the FireSmart Homeowner’s Manual, checklist, and videos.
===== RELATED:
- Western Canada wildfire scenarios get federal support (June 1, 2025)
- Westland Insurance releases wildfire preparedness guidelines (May 29, 2025)
- NEWS SECTIONS: LANGFORD | URBAN PLANNING & DEVELOPMENT | TREES & NATURAL HABITAT | EMERGENCY PREPAREDNESS | ENVIRONMENT & SUSTAINABILITY | WILDFIRE MANAGEMENT