Fort McMurray: 'Driving past flames ... is very familiar to me,' says Slave Lake MLA

Alberta's municipal affairs minister Danielle Larivee knows what it feels like to drive down a highway of flames.

"I know what it's like to leave your community, to leave your home, believing it won't be there when you come back," says Larivee, who's leading the province's response to the Fort McMurray wildfire.

Larivee is the MLA for Lesser Slave Lake, and spent 35 years in the small community that was ravaged by fire five years ago.

At the time, approximately 40 per cent of Slave Lake was destroyed, with a total of 374 properties leveled and 52 others damaged.

Insured damages totalled around $700 million, and the Insurance Bureau of Canada stated at the time that it was the second costliest disaster in Canadian history.

Now, estimates peg the cost of the Fort McMurray fire for insurers as high as $9 billion, and economists are cutting growth forecasts for the country.

But Larivee says the lessons of Slave Lake will stand Alberta's government in good stead as they face the daunting prospect of rebuilding. 

"The whole government of Alberta learned a lot [from Slave Lake], and having been there myself and having gone through it, I have such deep compassion for the people of Fort McMurray," Larivee tells Chris Hall on The House.

"All of this is certainly very familiar to me, but also familiar to me is that our community did come back, and we rebuilt. That shared experience, that same trauma, created a bond in the community that was substantial and gave us a really strong basis on which to work together to restore it."

For now though, Larivee says the focus remains on ensuring the safety of residents and stopping the fire from damaging the city any further.

"We're still very much in the response phase," she says. 

But as various levels of government come together to figure out that response, Larivee is adamant she's happy with the promptness of federal help in the crisis.

"We've had some disasters relatively recently, from floods to fires, and sometimes it's been a challenge ensuring we work together for the very best interest...but I'm certainly looking forward to having conversations about what the support is going to look like."