‘We’re still at the mercy of the U.S.’: Abbotsford farmer sees difficult road to preventing future floods

Abbotsford farmer Corry Spitters speaks to CTV News about the flood situation in the city.

Corry Spitters has seen this all before.

“It’s very much a repeat of what we had in ’21,” the farmer told CTV News Channel on Saturday.

Spitters operates Oranya Farms in Aldergrove, but has barns across the municipal boundary in Abbotsford as well. He said this year’s floodwaters came within an inch of his Sumas Prairie facility, but his neighbours weren’t so lucky.

“Right now, we dodged a bullet,” Spitters said. “One neighbour I spoke to lost five barns.”

He said this year’s flooding has done less damage than the November 2021 floods primarily because the water level in the Fraser River was lower this time around.

In 2021, the excess water couldn’t be pumped into the Fraser as quickly, and ended up overtopping and eventually breaching the dike system that holds back the Sumas River in Abbotsford. This year, so far, the dikes have held.

Spitters echoed Abbotsford Mayor Ross Siemens, who was highly critical of the federal government in his remarks on Friday, saying he was “disappointed and frustrated” that federal funding for flood mitigation plans had not been approved after the 2021 incident.

“The federal minister was on our farm four years ago,” Spitters said. “They promised that they would step up, that the money would be there and, like the mayor said, nothing has happened.”

Even if the federal government fully funds and constructs flood mitigation infrastructure in Abbotsford, he added, a long-term solution will take serious effort and expenditure south of the border too.

“We’re still at the mercy of the U.S. overflow,” Spitters said. “If they can’t control their water, we’re never going to get out of this mess.”