Saskatchewan increases wildfire funding ahead of fire season

The provincial budget is providing a slight increase to help fight wildfires this year. Jasmine Pelletier reports.

The provincial budget is providing a slight increase to help fight wildfires this year, but some were hoping to see a stronger commitment to wildfire preparedness.

Summer 2025 was an extreme wildfire season for Saskatchewan, with thousands forced to evacuate their communities.

The new provincial budget earmarks an extra $20 million, bringing the total to $140 million, for the Saskatchewan Public Safety Agency (SPSA).

The province says the SPSA will receive additional funding as part of a four-year commitment to purchase four re-purposed land-based airtanker aircraft.

Minister of Finance Jim Reiter is hoping for a less severe wildfire season.

“It’s essentially a bit of a status quo with an increase,” said Reiter about the wildfire preparation budget.

“There’s another new plane coming online, water bomber coming online. So, there’s an increase in that regard. But ‚hopefully we don’t have the kind of year we did last year, but if we did, we will no doubt we will respond.”

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The volunteer first responders tax credit will also double from $3,000 to $6,000 in the 2026-27 budget.

Prince Albert Grand Council (PAGC) Forestry and Protective services told CTV it’s good to see the volunteer first responders tax credit increase, but it was hoping to see more money committed to preparedness, prevention and firefighter retention.

Forestry and Protective Services says that money spent on mitigation and prevention could save on the cost of suppression.

NDP MLA Leroy Laliberte told reporters he wants the province to do more work with northern community members on wildfire management.

“So that we would never go through this again in our province,” said Laliberte. “The North is, you know, full of people that are land users, people that know that land and I think their input on what takes place as part of this fire management strategy is important.”

The province provided CTV with a statement, saying the SPSA has been working with northern communities on fire mitigation.

The statement goes on to say the PAGC provided more than 100 crew members to work on mitigation and that the SPSA will complete fuel mitigation through 2028 in 84 communities.

The province’s third quarter update for 2025-26 says “total expenses are projected to rise by $970 million, reflecting significant wildfire response activities and increased human services demands.”