The president of the Association of Yukon Fire Chiefs has welcomed the government’s latest step toward territory-wide, interim 911 service, but said his praise was conditional.

“I’m excited. But I’m still a little cautiously optimistic,” Jim Regimbal told the Star Tuesday.

“You can either be positive or negative — positive in the sense that the government has committed to a fully functional 911 system within the 24-month maximum,” he said.

But Regimbal also pointed out the “roadblocks and ... stalls along the way,” as well as the fact that full 911 services for all communities are likely still years away.

The government sought approval Monday from the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) for an “auto-select solution” to the Yukon’s 911 issues.

The system would allow callers in the communities to dial 911 from their landline or cell phone and then press 1 to call police, 2 to call an ambulance and 3 for the fire department.

As it stands, people in emergency scenarios can dial one of three seven-digit numbers, which differ in each community, to reach one of the three responders.

“We know that 911 saves lives. When someone’s in an emergency situation, they might not recall the proper number to call,” Regimbal said.

“It also helps to have a dispatcher asking the right questions on the other end and to alleviate that panic.”

He noted his association supports the auto-select option, “but only if it’s toward a full 911 system.

“This isn’t the be-all for a 911 system, because it isn’t a 911 system,” he added.

A letter to the government from the CRTC earlier this year states: “The Yukon interim rural 911 emergency response access system service proposed in your letter does not meet basic 911 or enhanced 911 service definitions.”

It will likely be up to five months before the territory hears back on its CRTC application to move forward with the Northwestel Inc.-run interim system, Regimbal said.

If approved, the auto-select system would cost the government a little more than $20,000 a year, a spokesperson said. The bulk of it would go into the coffers of Northwestel, which plans to run the interim system.

The elusive permanent 911 system would be much more expensive to implement and maintain, costing taxpayers up to $1 million a year, according to a government-commissioned study from 2009.

That money would go largely to the RCMP for costs associated with running a central dispatch centre.

Community Services Minister Brad Cathers hopes to have basic 911 services in place across the territory within two years.

He noted likely barriers include upgrades to Northwestel’s network, discussions with the RCMP and preempting potential problems like dispatchers lacking “local knowledge about where things are located within a community” — particularly smaller communities where, in an emergency or otherwise, landmarks are the go-to orientation devices, not addresses or intersections.

“We think those issues are resolvable, but we’ve made a commitment ... that we’re not going to force any municipalities to move to a system that they’re not comfortable with,” Cathers told the Star today.

Regimbal noted that the communities would not be getting the enhanced 911 service granted larger urban centres, receiving only the no-frills version.

One difference between the two is that, under the basic service, callers must tell the dispatcher where they are; the enhanced service pinpoints their locations and registers the information automatically.

Official Opposition Leader Liz Hanson expressed frustration with the possible human cost in communities deprived of 911.

“Even local people were confused what ... numbers to call,” she said. “You could lose a life that way.”

Hanson referred to an incident in Dawson City in May, when a house fire which threatened the life of a young person drew renewed attention to the lack of 911 services beyond the Whitehorse area.

The issue was lent renewed urgency three weeks later when three men had to call a family member hundreds of kilometres away to alert emergency responders that their jet boat had just capsized on the Stewart River.

They did not know the number for the local RCMP detachment.

Even if they had, officers are not always present, a defect partially remedied by an auto-select system that would redirect callers who don’t immediately find a voice on the other end of the line.

Hanson also criticized the government’s pace of progress in implementing it.

“It’s extraordinarily slow,” she told the Star Monday. “They’ve had committees studying this for multiple years.”

In February 2009, a 911 feasibility study for the government pegged the consumer cost of providing basic service throughout the territory at around $1 a month per landline or cell phone.

More recent estimates see the cost of upgrades — transferred to Northwestel customers — breaking down to about 80 cents per consumer each month.

Hanson questioned the decision to put so much energy into an interim auto-select system when the ultimate goal is genuine 911 service.

“It’s been suggested quite forcefully that the government’s work around interim solutions are not the best route to take,” she said.

“I understand that there are some complications coming from outside jurisdictions,” she added.

Liberal Leader and Klondike MLA Sandy Silver says the government has stalled for too long on bringing efficient emergency phone service beyond the Whitehorse area.

“This government has clearly made a determination that full 911 service is not a full priority for them in the Yukon,” Silver said in an interview after the Dawson house fire.

He highlighted the discrepancy between the Department of Community Services’s use of the term “911” for the auto-select system and the CRTC letter rejecting that definition.

“In order for CRTC to consider something 911, there must be a verbal exchange of information (with a central dispatcher),” Silver insisted.

“The system the minister did test in all Yukon communities does not include this essential exchange.”

Cathers acknowledges the deficiencies in the interim system but stands by the government’s recent application.

“This is a step toward ensuring that in every Yukon community if someone dials 911, that call actually goes somewhere,” he said of the auto-select system.

“I would agree that a 911 dispatch is the ultimate solution,” Cathers added.

Regimbal, as head of the Yukon fire chiefs’ association, thanked the minister for moving the process along to its current place in the hands of the CRTC.