This wildfire season has been a brutal one in Northern Ontario, with dry conditions creating the conditions for a whopping total of 604 fires so far—outstripping the 388 seen in 2025 and far above the 10-year average of 408 per year.
The fires have been big and nasty: more than a dozen communities have been evacuated, some with little or no notice. Images of Namaygoosisagagun First Nation (also known as Collins Lake) fleeing in small 12- and 14‑foot boats, crossing the lake while the community burned behind them have become iconic of the devastation in Northern Ontario.
Hundreds of other communities have been placed under evacuation alert. While many who have actually been evacuated have found temporary shelter in Thunder Bay, other northern towns such as Fort Frances remain ready to take in those fleeing stricken areas with little more than the clothes on their backs.
While it hasn’t happened for a decade, should Fort Frances receive the call to host evacuees, it can stage and prepare shelters within hours if possible, according to Building and Planning Superintendent John Burrows.
“If we got the call, it’s understandable that we can’t get people in the right places and resources available instantaneously, but we do look for a few hours. We would like to get it done within the day,” Burrows told the Times.
“We have an emergency evacuation trailer set up in town that has 500 cots and blankets. Three to five hours is where we could have everything staged, everything prepared to be receiving people, if declared as a host community for receiving specific evacuees.”
Though it hasn’t yet been called upon this year, the town has a history of hosting evacuees and would assist again if called upon, said Mayor Andrew Hallikas. In fact, it is in the frontier DNA of a small town such as Fort Frances to help its neighbours in a crisis.
“Fort Frances has hosted evacuees in the past, and would be prepared to assist if called upon, although we would require logistical aid from the province and organizations like the Red Cross,” Hallikas said. “The people of Fort Frances have always been very generous with their assistance for good causes and those less fortunate or in need.”
The town maintains two sets of plans: one for hosting evacuees, and one for evacuating Fort Frances itself, should that ever be necessary. Public‑facing portions of the emergency plan are available on the town website under Emergency Services, although some internal procedures are not publicly posted.
Burrows said the town’s plans to host evacuees are dependent on resource availability, coordination with the province and interoperability with partner agencies. The town would be in constant communication with the province and other agencies, including the OPP and designated relief groups such as the Red Cross and the recently formed Ontario Corps volunteer organization.
“We are in constant communication with the province. I’m looking to put together some of these resources and procedures in place for the potential of receiving evacuees in the near future, if requested by the province or other agencies,” Burrows said.
“There are a few options at play that we are in conversations with the province for, and we are looking at one of them where we would establish ourselves as basically an evacuation hub—I do have to comment that the province hasn’t declared an official term for this—where the province and the municipality would work together to have resources and personnel prepared for receiving evacuees in congregate settings throughout town, to be managed by the province.”
Shelter locations are already earmarked. The Memorial Sports Centre and Fort Frances High School are designated as congregate sites, with availability depending on programming such as whether rink facilities have ice installed. Other assembly areas—the curling club, school gymnasiums and similar facilities—could be activated if they have potable water, food‑preparation capacity and space for intake and triage.
Burrows stresses that such shelters are intended only for short‑term rest and safety before evacuees can be moved into hotels, with family members or into other longer‑term accommodations.
“The province does offer support with community service logistics, not just from a healthcare perspective, but also from a community safety perspective,” Burrows said.
“So they would be communicating with our local OPP detachment to ensure that they have the resources they need for the uptake of people that may be in the area.”
“Obviously, these people are leaving their homes. They are in sensitive and precarious situations, and that may lead to very tense and heated moments. We want to make sure that our police departments are prepared for handling and assisting with those, but the same goes for any sort of health-related or hospital care that’s needed. There would be conversations that are happening around what type of resources and support our healthcare industry needs.”
Staffing is a challenge; the town has limited personnel, so any hosting effort would rely on assistance from groups such as Ontario Corps, Red Cross and other provincial agents of record. Local volunteers can sign up through Ontario Corps, which the province now uses as a centralized emergency‑response volunteer system.
The town wouldn’t ask locals to host families displaced by an emergency, Burrows said, but volunteers are always appreciated.
“Anything that the citizens of the town can do is always greatly appreciated,” Burrows said.
“Obviously, anybody who wants to be a good neighbour, a good public citizen, that is their discretion to take people in, house people, assist people in need. It’s not part of the town policy because we don’t put the obligation on our citizens to do that.”
Burrows says Fort Frances maintains communication with Indigenous Services Canada and nearby First Nations, though the town often relies on the province as a liaison. Mutual aid agreements exist with nearby municipalities like Atikokan and Emo, and those lines of communication would expand during larger emergencies.
In terms of the cost of hosting evacuees, Burrows said Fort Frances would not shoulder the burden alone; should Fort Frances host evacuees from another community, expenses are billed back to the evacuated community and ultimately reimbursed through higher levels of government.
Burrows said the town and the fire department continue to monitor the Northwestern Ontario fire situation closely. In many ways, Fort Frances is fortunate in that it has some natural protection from the fires.
“We believe the town to be perfectly safe from these fires, especially with the winds coming from the west, and our physical characteristics being bordered on our east and south sides by water and our west side by farmlands,” Burrows said. “But that doesn’t mean we’re completely not at risk. If these emergencies were to happen, first and foremost, we would be communicating anything with the public about what is happening.”
“We understand that we’re just getting drier and hotter summers and the fire seasons have been starting earlier and earlier, and with that, we do need to be prepared for things like evacuating ourselves. But also the need to take on evacuees, and what the community can do if there is a fire on our doorstep.”
