Some positive developments are underway for the Little Shuswap Lake Band after a massive fire Sunday that destroyed the hotel portion of Quaaout Lodge.

As the band assesses the damage and recovery time for the lodge, Kukpi7 Jamie Tomma tells NL News they are able to open the Talking Rock Golf Course for business this Friday (May 27) after being temporarily shut down this past week following the fire.

However, Tomma says the timeline for getting the hotel back up and running isn’t clear, suggesting that it will all depend on how quickly the insurance claim processes.

“Regardless of what outside help we get, we are committed to rebuilding our lodge because it was quite a shock to the band members to lose something they considered a real center point in their life.”

Since the Talking Rock Golf Course is a major source of revenue for the area, Tomma explains that the band members who have been left unemployed should be fine for the interim, as the region can use the cash that golfers bring with them.

“Anything financial, our band is going to do okay,” he said. “We are concerned because our payroll for the lodge itself is extremely large, I think we are in the area of $600,000 every two weeks we pay out in payroll. That is going to cause a little bit of hardship because that is injected into the local economies surrounding us.”

Despite that concern, Tomma remains optimistic, stating that employees who lost their jobs because of the fire, will be repositioned into other departments.

“We might be able to run our restaurant, pro shop, and conference centre on a limited basis, hopefully within a couple of months.”

The Talking Rock Golf Course is rated as one of the top-20 in Canada and is a major draw for golf tourism during the summer months.