The evacuation was all a blur to Sue Cesco.
The Jasper resident was one of 25,000 people who fled town on July 22 due to the raging wildfires.
She is also one of the 800-or-so residents who have decided to return to their devastated community on Friday (Aug. 16).
Cesco was nervous about what she would see, breathe and smell but was excited to return regardless.
“We chose not to venture to the devastated part of town,” Cesco said in an email. “Just a glimpse was enough to understand the force that our first responders had to fiercely battle. Just a glimpse made our hearts sink, knowing Jasper's path ahead will be long and arduous.”
Cesco spent her weekend reconnecting, whether that was with neighbours, her garden, cleaning supplies or Jasper itself.
“Our dog has been reconnecting with the scents of all her daycare pals – her happy tail keeps us smiling,” she said. “We are also reconnecting with friends who needed help with appliances or assisting with checking in on their home – or the home of their parents.”
The experience continues to be surreal for Cesco, and while it felt normal to be home, it wasn’t normal at all for her hometown.
“The uncertainty is the greatest burden we can feel around us,” she said. “There is also great strength in the get-it-done attitude of perseverance, survival and support. Mountain people journey together. There is much strength in community – and we have renewed energy for the community of our corridors.”
With close to a third of the townsite lost, nearly half of residents are now without a home.
Raj Bhai, who lost his apartment, went to visit what was left with his son.
“It was hard to see him crying,” Bhai said in a phone interview, noting his son had grown up there. “He doesn’t understand because he’s very young to understand that thing.”
The backside of the apartment was destroyed, and Bhai is planning to grab whatever is left of their belongings later this month.
He said they were still lucky compared to others who had lost everything and didn’t have any insurance.
“Hopefully, we will be able to go back and grab our things,” Bhai added. “Hopefully, we will be able to go back to Jasper and find a place because we don’t want to lose the community. Jasper is very, very special for us.”
He said the help of the Canadian Red Cross and the community of Hinton, where they are staying, has been huge.
Local businesses, meanwhile, will need some time before starting up again, while some may never recover from the damage inflicted by the wildfires.
A handful of critical businesses began offering services again on Friday (Aug. 16), including the TGP grocery store, two gas stations, two pharmacies and two financial institutions.
Laurie-Ell Bashforth, who owns Jasper Pharmasave with her partner Merv, said in an email that they were invited to visit the town on Aug. 5 to determine how long it would take to reopen. Following a safety meeting last week, they were given approval to get the site ready.
“I was really anxious the night before,” Bashforth said. “We didn't know what to expect, with the town or our business. As we drove in, I just really wanted to take it all in. I wanted to honour and respect this beautiful place and what occurred here. When I saw the elk laying and grazing on the lawn of the Forest Park Hotel, I thought, ‘Nature finds a way forward, so can we.’”
Jasper Pharmasave is now fully open and offering the same service as usual, including daily deliveries to Hinton.
“Merv and I racked our brains for items that residents in Jasper may need, so we’ve increased our selection of cleaning and household products, PPE (gloves, masks, hand sanitizer),” Bashforth said. “We've shifted from the wants of tourists during peak season to the needs of the community now.”
Although their doors are wide open, the pharmacy hasn’t seen much business as the town’s residents trickle in and visitors are not allowed in the town.
“We went from what should be the busiest days of the year to far slower than the slowest days of the year,” Bashforth said. “That being said, we're grateful to be open, smile and give hugs, and serve our community in ways that might bring some sense of normality to their day.”
She added they were confident in the strength of the people in Jasper and the community will see better days.
“We know that'll take time. But we also know that our community will support us as we support them during this long recovery phase,” she said.
Many other businesses won’t be planning to open their doors anytime soon, some having their locations damaged or destroyed and others not able to recover from the financial blow right on the heels of COVID-19.
Candace Broughton, the owner of Jasper Motorcycle Tours, hasn’t been able to enter her business yet due to the entire building being fenced off.
Only trained professionals, such as Team Rubicon Canada or insurance representatives, are permitted to go behind the blue fencing placed around damaged properties.
“I do have to get all of my equipment and bikes and tools out of the basement at some point, so I'm kind of waiting for that approval to do that,” Broughton said in a phone interview.
“Business, as far as the motorcycle tours, is done for the year because there’s no tourism and there's nowhere to ride and I can't operate with no shop.”
Broughton is unsure about the future of her business. She has no place to operate since her location is damaged.
“We can't operate for the rest of the year and if I can't make money for the rest of the year, I can't get through the winter,” she said, noting that August and September were “moneymaking months” for local businesses.
“It's going to be really tough for a lot of people to survive through that,” she added.
Broughton didn't know what kind of support the federal government could offer her and was reluctant to take any potential loans, having just finished repaying her COVID ones.
If her business reopens, her tour offerings will be limited since many of the park’s sites have been scarred by wildfire, and tourism will likely take a while to recover, especially when half the town needs housing.
Her main consolation is that she has a job at the hospital, her husband has a job with Parks Canada and their house is still standing, meaning they could still live in Jasper.
“We can stay, and there's just so many who just can't,” she said. “There are people that work at the hospital that have no houses, and they got to live in a hotel or move. It's gonna be a long time to rebuild some of these houses and these places.”
