Fire may have destroyed Lake Okanagan Resort but it’s provincial government laws and rules about private water systems that are helping stall reconstruction of it and its neighbours, residents say.

The resort was largely destroyed in the 2023 McDougall Creek wildfire. Residents who relied on the resort’s private water utilities have been fighting to get the system rebuilt. The residents have pushed through red tape to get their own water license, now they need to get some help from the provincial government.

Heather Ormiston is a strata council member for the residents who lost their homes in the fire.

“Despite our efforts, there was no willingness to find or develop a funding mechanism to address our essential water and wastewater situation,” she said. “We’re not asking taxpayers to rebuild individual homes. We’re asking for help restoring the essential infrastructure because it benefits the broader community.”

She said they’re ready to rebuild their homes, but they want the government to find a way to pay for their essential water systems.

“We would like the current government to do three things. We would like them to engage directly with us, explore existing or alternative funding mechanisms for water and wastewater infrastructure. And we want them, thirdly, to consider whether policy or legislative changes are needed to address situations like ours,” Ormiston said.

West Kelowna-Peachland MLA Macklin McCall asked the province to use the Emergency Disaster Management Act to fund the water system earlier this year. The government didn’t listen at the time, but Ormiston is optimistic that the new BC Conservative government will be more amenable.

There are 50 homeowners, including several families, who have been displaced and unable to rebuild their homes.

“It’s been really frustrating. And it’s been stressful, because we have a lot of people that are displaced, they’re barely making it month to month,” she said. “They want to go home.”

The utility system was owned and operated by Lake Okanagan Resort.

The resort has proven difficult to deal with, and has been dragged into court on several occasions including for not paying a $250,000 wildfire clean-up bill and $1 million case for improper sewage disposal.

While residents struggled with the aftermath of the fire the resort’s ownership was hard to get a hold of, so Ormiston said the residents managed on their own and got their own water permits and approvals.

“We’ve obtained an independent water license. We are now independent from the Lake Okanagan Resort. We don’t want to talk about the resort. We don’t even want to think about them,” she said.

She said it has been a huge and expensive effort for those who want to rebuild their homes, and now they want the provincial government to step in and help pay for the water infrastructure.

This isn’t the only case in the Okanagan of residents struggling because of mismanaged private water utilities. People in Sage Mesa near Penticton are in a similar situation because of how their water system was managed and they too want the provincial government to step up and cover the costs.

There are 122 private water utilities in B.C. that supply roughly 20,000 households. Ormiston said it’s the provincial government’s responsibility to oversee these utilities, and they need to step up to help residents.

“We know we’re not going to be the last situation like this,” she said.