Habitat success
Home for single mom raises $100K in 100 days Page A5
SPORTS: Pickleball takes over Pearkes Arena /A3 NEWS: No drought fears in Capital Region for now /A7 ARTS: Bowker Creek Brush Up wants artists /A17
SAANICHNEWS Friday, June 12, 2015
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Saanich brush fires keep crews hopping Smouldering started mostly by cigarette butts accounts for 17 emergency responses since May Kendra Wong Black Press
Daniel Palmer/News staff
Stephen Olsen, executive director of the Royal Oak Burial Park, and artist Paula Jardine are preparing the park for the sixth annual Summer So(u)lstice celebration, a day of music, poetry and refreshments with a community feel slated for Saturday, June 20. The community-owned cemetery puts on the positive, friendly event in the hope that more residents will feel comfortable exploring the 134-acre property.
Burial park shows there’s more to death than sadness Daniel Palmer News staff
As Paula Jardine reflects on planning her father’s burial, she remembers how the offerings for a sombre affair didn’t feel quite right. A local artist by trade, Jardine started took it upon herself to
research funeral rights across the world in an attempt to create a more celebratory event for her next visit to a cemetery. “I just thought, ‘We must bring more beauty to this,’” Jardine says. For the past six years, that’s exactly what Jardine and her friends have been doing at the Royal Oak Burial
Park in Saanich. Each June, musicians, poets, local residents and many who have loved ones buried in the park gather for Summer So(u) lstice, an afternoon event that focuses on the positive memories of life. PlEASE SEE: Royal Oak Burial Park, Page A4
With unseasonably warm temperatures, dry weather and lack of moisture, local fire departments are bracing for a long season of grass and mulch fires. “With the way things are right now, things are really dry out there. Our hazard rating in Greater Victoria, certainly in Saanich, is at high and that means the surface fuels are very dry. So grass fires are very easy ignited,” said Capt. Richard Pala of the Saanich Fire Department. Saanich Fire responded to 59 grass fires in 2014, but they’ve already seen 20 grass fires this season – 14 of which took place in May and three this month. The main culprit is cigarette butts. “People go out and have a smoke break and in two hours it’s gone from smouldering to flaming,” said Pala, noting that many of the fires occurred in front of businesses such as gas stations, offices or bus stops. Broken glass, which can magnify the rays of the sun, are also cause for concern, he said. Victoria Fire Department has also seen a significant increase in the number of mulch fires. From January
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to June of this year, crews have responded to 23 mulch fires, almost double the amount from the previous year. “With the exceedingly dry conditions, (fires) can start with something as simple as a cigarette butt being carelessly discarded to someone deliberately setting it with a match or a lighter,” said Doug Carey, deputy chief with the Victoria Fire Department. He noted it takes a minimum of one fire truck and four firefighters to respond to a mulch or grass fire. In Oak Bay, the fire department is keeping a close eye on grass levels in parks. “Right now we’re monitoring our grass levels. Some of the areas like Anderson and Gonzales hills there, we’re starting to look at whether or not that’s going to be posted in the next week or so, with regards to fire danger for those grass areas,” said Oak Bay Fire Chief Dave Cockle, adding that they’ve had two bark mulch fires in June, both outside the Oak Bay Recreation Centre. “We are monitoring just because the weather has been so good and we’ve had limited rain fall for almost four weeks now.” PlEASE SEE: Warm weather, Page A4
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