Edmonton restaurants offer free, discounted meals for NWT wildfire evacuees

With thousands of wildfire evacuees from the Northwest Territories temporarily calling Edmonton home, restaurant and lounges in the city wanted to do their part to help.

Some business owners are offering food items for free or at a discount for wildfire evacuees.

The general manager of Reign on Jasper Avenue says putting the initiative together was a collective effort.

“A bunch of us did speak about it. We decided to help out,” Moji Arya told CityNews. “A lot of them were coming in, quite a bit of them, so as a group we all decided to all around downtown give discounts and free meals to evacuees.”


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The goal is to help evacuees get comfortable in Edmonton and take their minds off the fires up north, which got worse over the weekend. On Sunday heat warnings were initiated in the NWT as fires continue to move towards Hay River.

A wildfire burns south of Enterprise, N.W.T., Thursday, Aug. 17, 2023. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Jeff McIntosh

There are 6,000 wildfire evacuees from the territory in Edmonton – more than double the number originally planned for.

Most are staying in hotels. The Edmonton EXPO Centre is no longer welcoming new evacuees due to limited hotel capacity in the city.

“It’s a nice get a way sort of to get their minds off of sort of what’s going on over there and come and enjoy a meal here,” said Arya.

Food from Reign lounge in Edmonton, pictured Aug. 27, 2023, which is offering free or discounted meals for wildfire evacuees. (Adam Ziccarelli, CityNews)

Because the Reign lounge is relatively new to Edmonton, Arya says it felt right to give back to newcomers and help those in need.

“To bring in the crowd to help us out, and help them out at the same time,” said Arya. “Get the word out there, get the name out there and just let people know we’re here and we cater to everyone.”

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