The British Columbia Road Builders and Heavy Construction Association (BCRB&HCA) is receiving a $3.9 million grant from the B.C. provincial government for skills training.

The three-year grant will provide funding for BCRB&HCA’s talent attraction program, which will utilize innovative training technologies to showcase key jobs within the industry. With a focus on hiring, training, and retaining new employees for the highway maintenance and road building industry, the program seeks to address a critical shortage of skilled road builders for highway maintenance positions.

“Helping employers remove barriers to the workplace means more people can work and participate in their communities,” said Sheila Malcolmson, minister of Social Development and Poverty Reduction. “Our government is funding this skills training so that more people can get good in-demand jobs in the highway maintenance and road building industry.”

Highway maintenance contractors in B.C. are facing a shortage of plow truck drivers, heavy equipment operators and mechanics. As part of the program’s outreach to groups that are currently underrepresented in the industry, it will establish pathways for sustained employment and aim to engage women, Indigenous Peoples, veterans, new immigrants, and individuals under 40 years of age via training and partnership opportunities.

Using innovative simulator technologies that place prospective jobseekers in the driver’s seat of snow plows and other types of heavy equipment, the program will travel across the province and provide hands-on opportunities for participants.

“Investments like these are vital for the strength of communities in B.C.,” said Matt Pitcairn, vice president, BCRB&HCA. “We look forward to how this program will raise the profile of these jobs, and how they can be an important catalyst for the economic health of the province.”

Implementation of the talent attraction program is slated to begin in spring 2024 and reach completion in spring 2026.