A Fort McMurray law firm is running a social media campaign to gather and collect positive stories about the city.
Cooper and Company has been in Fort McMurray since 1975. Manager partner Terry Cooper has been with the law firm since 1980.
“Fort McMurray was getting an awful lot of bad press. People were coming up to Fort McMurray and saying negative things about the oilsands and negative things about Fort McMurray. We kind of got tired of it,” Cooper said.
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“The idea was, we want to promote good things about Fort McMurray and be proud we were from McMurray and that Fort McMurray was our home.”
The campaign had been up and running for two-and-a-half years but it recently gained traction after a massive wildfire forced the evacuation of 90,000 people from the city. It uses the hashtags #ymmproud and #mcmurraymyhome.
Marketing coordinator Jennifer Comtois said, that before the wildfire, the initiative’s Facebook page had a couple hundred likes. Now it has more than 2,000 likes. One story shared involved a young Edmonton girl giving a ‘hope tree’ back to Fort McMurray.
“Take a step back. Things are going to be okay.”
Comtois said the social media campaign is even more critical now as thousands of residents are scattered across the country.
“I think it’s that much more crucial to show we are a community. It’s not just people that are working at the oilsands. It’s families like me – I work at a law firm, my mother works at the airport.”
Cooper said there has been more Fort McMurray pride since the wildfire, and he is optimistic about the future.
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“We had the fire – it was unfortunate. But we are going home. We are going to rebuild. Our community is going to be there. Our jobs are going to be there. The oilsands industry is going to be there. The other businesses in Fort McMurray are going to be there.”
The law firm has temporarily relocated to an office space in the north end of Edmonton. Cooper said he plans to return to the law firm, which is located downtown, soon after residents are allowed to re-enter the city on June 1.
He said the building the law firm is in is still standing and there are hopes the firm will be back in the city in operation by mid-June.
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