In July, as wildfires began to approach several Kootenay communities, Aimee Watson realized phone lines were failing.

There is no cellphone coverage in the region north of Kaslo, and residents rely instead on landlines and the internet to communicate. But when people began turning to Watson for help, the Regional District of Central Kootenay's board chair and elected representative for Area D wasn't sure what to do.

Watson called Telus, which is the local landline provider, but she was told the company only responds to individual complaints and not community outages. She gathered account numbers from four residents to show the issue was widespread and called Telus back, only to hear the repair date wouldn't occur until late August.

鈥淚 was like, 鈥楿nacceptable, please, there's a fire approaching this community. We have to be able to communicate with them, and there is no cell service,鈥� and they just had no provisions for how to address a community outage.鈥�

Several days later service began to return for some residents, but that week the communities of Argenta and Johnsons Landing were forced to evacuate.

The incident has led to the RDCK voting in favour of Watson's motion that it request a meeting with Federal Heritage Minister Pascale St-Onge. Watson said federal assistance is needed to replace what she describes as "archaic" telecommunications infrastructure in the area, as well as develop a more efficient way for major telecoms such as Telus to respond to community emergencies.

A Telus spokesperson told the Nelson Star that it has a general manager for the area who has previously been in contact with Watson. 

"Telus has a comprehensive outage monitoring and response system that alerts us to potential and ongoing issues so that we can take appropriate action immediately, including dispatching technicians to troubleshoot, notifying community members, and co-ordinating with first responders and authorities in emergency situations and wildfires. We do not require individual account holders to contact us before we respond."

Watson said one solution is the installation of a cell tower, but she's been told by Telus that there's no business case to be made for that work in an area with a population of just 1,462 (Telus did not dispute this, but said it is committed to rural and remote wireless service).

She also believes there might be some community resistance to a tower, but that the need outweighs all other concerns.

"I know there are people who will be opposed to cellphone towers, but I'll eat that and just say you need to be able to communicate an emergency."

An unreliable power grid is also hampering communications.

Failures are common in Area D 鈥� Watson said four have already occurred in the last month 鈥� and any time it happens the landlines don't work. Phone lines come equipped with backup batteries, but Watson said Telus has been inconsistent in changing out old or broken batteries.

Telus said it last replaced backup batteries three years ago in the Lardeau Valley. In a power outage those batteries last 24 hours, which Telus said is more than enough time for crews to install back-up generators provided roads are clear and there's no immediate danger to its employees.

Watson said BC Hydro has increased its vegetation removal program for the area, which removes trees that could possible damage power lines. The RDCK has also funded a program run by the Lardeau Valley Opportunity LINKS Society that provides a free home assessment similar to FireSmart but for power backup and renewable energy options.

Dan S茅guin, the RDCK's director of its Emergency Operations Centre (EOC), told the Nelson Star in an email that its wildfire operations last summer weren't impacted by communications issues. 

"The unique communication environment in the Lardeau Valley area is known to our EOC and pre-planned for. So, while it did require flexibility, the overall response was not significantly hindered by communication breakdowns."

The RDCK also uses the Voyent Alert notification system, which provides information on emergencies to residents who have signed up for the service. The alerts come via text messages, landline calls and emails, but if there's a power outage only emails will work in Area D.

When an evacuation event occurs, Watson said residents can sometimes see it coming in advance or will be notified by neighbours and emergency services. But a working telecommunication system is also needed for individual health needs. Seniors and other vulnerable people who rely on landlines are at risk if the power is out.

鈥淚 think with emergencies on a community scale, there's more opportunities to be aware. Even if they're not the standard approach we generally have a lot of communication through so many different channels going on that people are going to know. But if you have a personal emergency and you're alone, you have no ability to communicate that.鈥�

The region's internet is reliable thanks to Kaslo infoNet Society, which has its own backup power generator. The society offers a Voice-over-Internet-Protocol (VoIP) service that it promotes as a replacement for landlines.

But even this hasn't been an easy fix. Transferring a landline over to the VoIP system requires the phone number be released by Telus. Hillary Schell, who helps manage the VoIP service, said Telus has been blocking numbers instead of releasing them. This has led to users not being able to receive any calls from landline users in the area, and can also take up to 10 days for Telus to fix.

In that time, Schell said residents may be missing important calls from their doctor, their neighbours or local schools. 鈥淚t鈥檚 a fairly big problem."

Schell said Kaslo infoNet has not been able to speak with Telus management about the issue. It's also taken the matter to the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission, which is the regulatory body for all telecom companies, as well as the Commission for Complaints for Telecom-television Services. But because the society is an internet-service provider and not a customer, those complaints have gone nowhere. 

Telus told the Nelson Star it does not block numbers when it receives transfer requests, and that 10 business days is typical for the process to be completed.

"Customers will still have the ability to receive and make calls during the porting process, as long as their physical connections have not been modified." 

Watson's letter to the heritage minister will include a request that a formal process be created for small internet providers in need of speaking directly with the major telecoms.

The RDCK, she said, cannot afford to build and manage its own telecommunications infrastructure. A solution for Area D has to come from the federal government.

鈥淔rankly, this is not my jurisdiction, but it鈥檚 not going anywhere and the emergency issues are only one power outage away.鈥�