Pathfinders: How Jasper Looks After Its Own, One Conversation at a Time

Shawnee Janes Wilson has called Jasper home for 53 years. She knows this town the way only someone who has lived it for decades can: its rhythms, its people, its capacity to look after its own. She's a friendly face to many, and when a neighbour stops her on the street, drawn to the fireweed emblem on her toque, she's ready to listen. Some days that means pointing someone toward mental health resources. Other times it means sitting down for a hard conversation, or dropping off a home-cooked meal.

"It's really reconnected me to the community, not that I wasn't connected before, but we're in a different landscape now," Wilson says. "When we all came back from the evacuation, it was really important to just be there for people and be sensitive to them. Some people I knew really well, and I couldn't even give a hug to - they weren't ready to give a hug yet. It was really quite something."

Wilson is a Pathfinder, one of 113 Jasper residents trained as peer supporters through a community-led program built on a simple idea: a town rebuilds through neighbours showing up for neighbours, not through infrastructure or investment alone.

The program was conceived by a working group chaired by Doug Olthof, Director of Recovery at the Municipality of Jasper, on the premise that rebuilding a community means more than rebuilding its buildings. "The wildfire, in addition to doing physical damage to the community and the forest, had done damage to the fabric of community," Olthof says. "The circles of community had been ruptured. Pathfinders is part of an overall approach to rebuild those circles and the connections that support people within them."

Pursuit has supported the program through the Jasper Tourism Recovery and Prosperity Fund, a $5.5 million commitment established by Pursuit and Jasper's other tourism operators in February 2025 to help the town rebuild after the 2024 wildfire. Pathfinders received the fund's first disbursement.

Helping Hands and Familiar Faces

Olthof set out with the idea to train local residents as peer supporters. Pathfinders are not therapists, but rather neighbours who can listen and offer guidance. As of Spring 2026, over 100 locals have completed Pathfinders training. The goal is 150 by year's end. Pathfinders has even been nationally recognized and replicated by other communities.

Olthof has been involved in Jasper's recovery from the very beginning, giving him a "great sense of purpose" during a challenging period for the community. The response to Pathfinders has been excellent from the outset. It's given residents an opportunity to be actively involved in the recovery.

"I think it's very easy for people to feel somewhat helpless in these processes," he notes. "It's very easy for people to feel like it's happening to them, and Pathfinders is an opportunity for people to become directly involved and engaged. I think that was something people in the community were looking for, and a lot of people have taken that opportunity and run with it."

Becoming a Pathfinder

At the start, Pathfinder volunteers were recruited by reaching out to natural connectors in the community and by asking folks to nominate fellow residents. As interest grew, Olthof broadened the process to allow self-nominations. Pathfinders now span a diverse range of ages, socioeconomic backgrounds and experiences.

"Our objective with this program was to try to make sure that everyone in the community is just one or two connections away from a Pathfinder," Olthof explains.

To become a Pathfinder, volunteers enroll in a one-month training program focused on community supports, suicide prevention, navigating the rebuild and mental health first aid. They receive an Arc'teryx backpack and other gear embroidered with the Pathfinders fireweed logo upon graduation, helping identify them as Pathfinders when they're out and about in the community. Pathfinders receive ongoing support through monthly meetups to build peer support skills and check in on one another.

"The skill sets that people are trained in as Pathfinders are applicable to any situation," he adds. "There are always going to be people in your lives, in your circles, who are struggling, whether that's with their employment, their family life, their mental health, whatever it may be. And so those skills of being able to recognize and support people and direct them to professional support are always going to be useful."

For Wilson, those skills have become another way to care for the community she's called home for more than five decades.

"It's really heartwarming," Wilson says. "I feel so lucky to be able to live in this community and be able to contribute to our recovery."

Pathfinders is one of several initiatives supported by the Jasper Tourism Recovery and Prosperity Fund, which invests in the people, programs and services that strengthen Jasper's long-term recovery. Most recently, the fund contributed $400,000 toward the expansion of Wildflowers Childcare, creating more childcare spaces for local families.