Charlottetown's new emergency plan is in the works

The City of Charlottetown is making progress on a new plan for dealing with extended power outages.

After a storm in December, Charlottetown Mayor Clifford Lee said some areas were without power for up to 21 hours, and the city didn't even know about it.

• Power outage emergency protocol in the works for Charlottetown

Fire Chief Randy MacDonald, who is also the city's emergency measures co-ordinator, has been working on the new plan.

"What we're looking at right now is once a power failure occurs, if it's out for an extended period of time, then Maritime Electric will contact the city at which time we'll turn around and make a decision on whether we have to open up emergency shelters or not," said MacDonald.

"If we do, then we'll contact Red Cross, who we have a contract with every year, and they will establish reception centres. And they'll be in different locations throughout the city wherever we determine the need is."

The city has agreements with both Atlantic Coach and the English Language School Board to use their buses to transport people to shelters. Both Superstore locations in the city have signed on to help with supplies, and negotiations are underway with Sobeys.

In addition to some of the already established shelter spots, such as the CARI Centre, council would like to get generators for 13 schools in the city so they can also act as emergency shelters.

It's estimated the plan will cost about $4 million, but Coun. Kevin Ramsay, chair of the advanced planning, priorities and special projects committee, said he expects the money to be in the 2016 budget.