'It's always a concern': Bow Valley's labour shortages persist as ski season approaches

Bow Valley employers are heading into the winter hiring season with plenty of jobs to fill, but a smaller pool of international workers to draw from as a result of federal and provincial changes continue to pose challenges.

The Job Resource Centre (JRC) hosted its annual winter hiring fair in Banff on Tuesday, drawing about 200 job seekers, and will hold a second fair in Canmore on Tuesday as employers across the area look to fill positions before the ski season gets underway.

It is the first time the centre has held separate winter hiring fairs in both communities, a change Michel Dufresne, director of the JRC, said reflects growing demand. More than 30 employers are participating across the two events.

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“It’s been a hard summer,” Dufresne said. “ Everyone’s been short staffed this summer and they don’t want to be short staffed in the winter.”

As of Sept. 18, JRC has 201 job postings. Sixty-one of those postings are for food and beverage, with 24 for hotels and housekeeping. That means roughly 42 per cent of the job board comprises hospitality jobs.

“I don’t think it’s a surprise that the Bow Valley is currently facing a labour shortage,” said Rachel Ludwig, CEO of Tourism Canmore Kananaskis (TCK). “That labour shortage is really year round, so we’re expecting that the winter hiring season will be just as challenging as the summer has been.”

Ludwig said the shortages have been an issue since 2024, when Canada reduced the number of new international students and temporary workers entering the country.

The federal government introduced a cap on international student study permit applications in 2024, with the country seeing a steep drop in ensuing years. According to Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada, 292,885 new international students arrived in 2024. In 2025, that number fell to 115,005, when the government’s target was 305,900.

Eligible international students can work up to 24 hours a week during academic terms, making them part of the potential labour pool for hospitality businesses.

The federal government also tightened the Temporary Foreign Worker Program in 2024. The standard cap for low-wage temporary foreign workers (TFW) was reduced from 15 to 10 per cent of a business’ total workforce, with some sector-specific exceptions.

An exemption was introduced in March 2026 for rural communities — which allows businesses to keep existing TFWs and have 15 per cent of their workforce be TFWs — but the Government of Alberta declined to participate.

“We were partially hurt by Ottawa this spring,” said Ludwig. “It would have made a difference but, unfortunately, the province would have had to sign off on that and they declined . . . which creates some more competition, because next door B.C., they did sign on.”