St. Albert gathering helps raise awareness about effects of residential schools
'People need to come together and be heard and heal,' organizer says
WARNING: This story contains details some readers may find distressing.
About 150 people attended an event in St. Albert Sunday designed to help raise awareness about the ongoing effects of residential schools.
The event, with elders, knowledge keepers and residential school survivors, was hosted at Mission Park by Winds of Change Indigenous Alliance, a group co-founded by Tannis Hyde and Crystal Lucier.
Lucier said both women have Métis and Treaty ancestry, and that the idea for the event came after the recent discovery of a burial site adjacent to the former Kamloops Indian Residential School.
"We thought it would be important for us to get together and talk about what does this mean for us, some of the generations that are dealing with the trauma and where do we go from here?" Lucier said.
"There has to be a way that we can help. There has to be a way that we can bring people together."
Lucier said she was proud and happy that so many people were interested in being there. She said it was important for spreading awareness and asking hard questions.
"People need to come together and be heard and heal. I think that a lot of people will go home both in appreciation for our cultures and also maybe some extra questions that they wouldn't have had before," she said.
"And questions are good because that means that they were here, they were present and they were aware. And now they have questions that need to be answered. So there will be digging going on."
Lucier said not everyone knows about the true history of Canada. She talked about how she thinks some people don't absorb what it means for communities across the country to be without clean drinking water, for example.
According to the federal government, 51 long-term drinking water advisories in 32 communities are in effect right now.
"Imagine if St. Albert, half of St. Albert, was without clean drinking water for even 12 months, let alone three or five years. It would be hugely impactful. And so we want that recognized for our communities as well, that there are so many things that need to be different," she said.
Lucier said the group has plans for helping communities and raising awareness in a similar way in the future.
With files from Emily Fitzpatrick