We’re writing to all of you to recognize and acknowledge just how wrenching the past few days have been to live through. We all have friends, family and colleagues whose lives have been upended by the floods, landslides and storms we’ve seen this week.
The loss of life is tragic. And there has been massive economic and social devastation to affected communities, First Nations, farms and our transportation lifelines, much of which will endure for months and even years.
We salute the courage, dedication and persistence of our fellow workers, many of them your members, who have made such heroic efforts to keep people and homes safe and restore the infrastructure we rely on. And we take great heart in the way British Columbians have responded to this crisis with compassion and solidarity.
This province will need to count on that spirit of solidarity as we take on the work not only of rebuilding from this catastrophe, but investing in the resilience of our communities and infrastructure to withstand the storms we know will come in the future — and making the profound, urgent changes we need to forestall even worse calamities by addressing climate change.
In the meantime, people need our help immediately. The BCFED has made a contribution to the United for BC Flood Response Fund as well as to the Migrant Rights Network’s fund for displaced migrant farmworkers. If your union is in a position to contribute to these or other relief efforts, we encourage you to consider making a donation.
And we know you join us in sending support and solidarity to everyone who has been affected by this crisis, and our deepest thanks to everyone helping us get through it.
In solidarity,
Laird Cronk and Sussanne Skidmore