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The Regional District of East Kootenay (RDEK) has decided to stop changing its clocks after this fall and join the rest of B.C. in the new Pacific time zone.
Currently, the RDEK matches its clocks with Alberta, putting it one hour ahead of the rest of British Columbia.
But with the majority of the province doing away with biannual time changes, leaders in the RDEK, which includes Cranbrook, Kimberley and other communities near the Alberta border, have decided to follow suit.
A provincial decision about daylight saving time is raising questions in the East Kootenay. While most of British Columbia plans to stop switching clocks twice a year, communities in the area will continue to follow mountain time. As the CBC’s Amber Wang reports, residents have mixed reactions about what should happen next.
“We looked at a few different options with regard to how to move forward, and in the end, voted in favour of adjusting our time in November to align with the rest of B.C.,” said RDEK Board Chair Rob Gay in a statement.
The vote was not unanimous, with the decision narrowly passing 8-7, which Gay says led to a “lively discussion.”
Speaking to CBC News afterward, Gay said most of the debate was around whether it would make sense to determine if Alberta would also be switching to a year-round time zone, given how many tourists, seasonal residents and businesses cross over from that province.
The other main area of discussion, he said, was whether the board should seek more public feedback before making a decision.
But in the end, he said, the majority of people felt they’d already heard from enough residents in the area to know which direction opinion would lean.
“Since B.C. changed their rules, we’ve had a lot of feedback, even just on the street,” he said. “People want to just rip off the Band-Aid.”
Golden, Field remain on mountain time but that will likely change
The province has said that individual local governments, including municipalities, can still set their own individual time zones.
As it stands, the only regions continuing to do so are a handful of communities in Electoral Area A of the Columbia-Shuswap Regional District (CSRD), closest to the Alberta border, including Field and Golden.
Golden previously stated it would remain aligned with Alberta but also said it would take a “measured and coordinated approach,” working closely with other neighbouring communities “to ensure alignment.”
Following the decision from the RDEK, an agenda item to discuss next steps was added to Golden’s council meeting, scheduled for Tuesday afternoon.
Gay said based on what he’s hearing, it’s likely those neighbouring communities will join the RDEK in adopting Pacific time.
He said while some constituents have asked why there wasn’t more consultation or are trying to make the case for a different time zone, many are just happy they won’t be changing their clocks again after November.
B.C. Premier David Eby announced that the province will move to permanent daylight time this spring, meaning clocks will no longer change twice a year.
“There’s a lot of ‘Thanks for making a decision,'” he said.
University of British Columbia business professor Werner Antweiler says decisions about time zones come down to practical economic ties.
He says if most of a community’s commercial activity is tied to a neighbouring jurisdiction, such as B.C. border communities doing business with Alberta, there can be economic advantages to staying in the same time zone.
“The net economic benefit falls on the side of staying in the same time zone as other neighbouring communities,” Antweiler said. “This is particularly the case in northeast B.C. where the Rocky Mountains form a natural barrier and most economic activity is linked more with Alberta than with B.C.”
Many British Columbians favour ending clock changes
A survey by the Angus Reid Institute found strong support in British Columbia for ending the practice of changing clocks twice a year.
Among B.C. respondents, nearly 50 per cent said they would prefer staying on daylight saving time year-round, while 37 per cent favoured standard time, which means earlier sunrises. About 15 per cent said they would rather keep switching clocks in the spring and fall.
The poll surveyed more than 3,000 Canadian adults between March 11 and 16.