Wher Creator
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Wher Creator Sit T h e Q u e s t t o P r o t e c t T h e E a s t S i d e o f L a k e W i n n i p e g I dedicate this story to the people living on the East side of Lake Winnipeg whose voices have often been forgotten, but who stood strong. Your ancestors would be proud. Photographs and story by Don Sullivan Giizheg Kinew Inini March 2021 The opinions in this report, and any errors, are those of the authors, and do not necessarily reflect the views of CCPA Manitoba March 2021 The Ouest to Protect The East Side of Lake Winnipeg page 2 T his is my story, my own recollection of My relationship to land on the East side thus the Boreal Forest Network (BFN) was events that took place during my of Lake Winnipeg started back in my born. involvement in the efforts to protect University days in the early 1980s. the East side of Lake Winnipeg. BFN ended up sharing office space with I used to do solo weekend canoe trips the Manitoba Eco-Network on Albert I apologize up front if I left out key into Nopiming Provincial Park. Then in Street in Winnipeg’s Old Market Square. people and events. This is not meant to 1983 the Province of Ontario created the be an exhaustive account, but rather Woodland Caribou Park, sister park to In 1997 the highly influential World reflections on my own personal Manitoba's Atikaki Wilderness Park, which Resource Institute released its Last Forest journey. Other people involved in this was created two years later in 1985. I Frontier report, which said that Russia, campaign, and believe me there were ended up convincing a couple of co- Canada and Brazil, in that order, had the plenty of folks involved, can tell their workers at the United Army Surplus Store world’s largest remaining primary intact own version of events about this on Portage Ave. to accompany me on a frontier forests. campaign to protect the East side of 14-day canoe trip in the newly created Lake Winnipeg. park and into Manitoba. The pan-boreal forests are literally the Northern Lungs of the World. Dates and places are based on my My story to protect the East side of Lake memory, newspaper clippings and my Winnipeg did not fully start until around I met Garry Raven, an Anishinaabe extensive files. What follows is not 1998, but really it started well before traditional elder from Hollow Water First intended to be an authoritative this. Nation, sometime in 1994. He asked me academic account—that would require to come to Sagkeeng First Nation to a book to achieve. I was approached sometime in 1996 by attend a sweat lodge ceremony run by Colleen McCrory, the 1992 recipient of Fabian Morrisseau. I felt the need to write my story when the Goldman Environmental Prize, and Manitoba Premier Brian Pallister asked if I would consider taking on the This ceremony turned out to be a pivotal released the economic review of role of being the North American point in my journey to help protect the Bipole III and Keeyask, prepared by Coordinator for the Taiga Rescue East side of Lake Winnipeg. It was also a former Saskatchewan Premier Brad Network, an international pan-boreal key part of my own journey as a person, Wall in November 2020. organization that was founded in 1992 in and my connection to the land. Finland and disbanded in 2010. This report reached an inaccurate It was at this sweat lodge ceremony that I conclusion. It claimed there was no However, I said that for the purposes of was introduced to other elders in the compelling evidence of sufficient North America, we needed to call the area, including Mark Thompson and John opposition to force the government of North American node of the Taiga Rescue Kent. From that point onward I had no Manitoba to make a decision, in 2005, Network something else, because no one choice but to help. to scrap Manitoba Hydro's plans to in North America, other than scientists, construct Bipole III down the East of had ever heard of the boreal forest being All of these East side Elders have since Lake Winnipeg. Wall is wrong: there was referred to as the Taiga. gone to the spirit world, sadly. plenty of opposition. March 2021 The Quest to Protect the East Side of Lake Winnipeg page 3 In the spring of 1998, I helped Gary Raven organize the first of many gatherings of the Anishinaabe Turtle Island Protectors (ATIP), at Raven's Creek in Hollow Water First Nations. The Raven's Creek gathering of grassroots traditional Indigenous Peoples from the area, along with non- Indigenous people, was held to discuss Tembec's proposed forestry plans. Tembec had just purchased the Pine Falls Paper Company paper mill, with the intention of expanding their forestry operations up the East side of Lake Winnipeg. Their plan included a 730 km all-weather road north of Hollow Water First Nation, so they could access the primary intact boreal forest in the Integrated Wood Supply Area East. In June of 1998, I assisted Gary Raven and ATIP in organizing a march to bring attention to Tembec's Garry Raven picking blueberries at Black Island expansion plans for the entire East side of Lake Winnipeg. Roughly 150 Following the march to Tembec's It was rumoured that the Minister of people, mostly Indigenous, marched paper mill, Gary Raven as the Transportation, Darren Praznick, had from Clark's Corner at the junction of lead for ATIP and I as the made a commitment to Tembec that if Hwy. 304 and Hwy. 11, to the office coordinator for BFN spent the re-elected, the Filmon government would of the paper mill plant located some next several months meeting with foot the bill for Tembec's all-weather 3km away in Pine Falls, Manitoba. road up the East side of Lake Winnipeg. When the marchers showed up at the government officials, with Cabinet Ministers from the Gary Filmon front doors of the offices of the paper Apparently, the Transport Minister mill, Gary laid out his sacred bundle government, and with elected First Nations leaders from failed to mention this commitment to on the front lawn of the office and did Premier Filmon, which, I have been told, various East side of Lake a pipe ceremony, after which we had a led to a shouting match between the brief meeting with Tembec officials. Winnipeg communities. Premier and Minister Praznick that could be heard throughout the hallways We met also with members of the of the Legislative Building. Manitoba NDP, the Official Opposition at the time, while all I had learned that Bob Rae, former NDP along the way we were building Premier of Ontario and now the allies in order to strengthen Canadian Ambassador to the United opposition to Tembec's forest Nations, was on the Board of Directors expansion plans. of Tembec and I just happened to know someone who had his personal cellphone For Gary's efforts, ATIP was number. So, in the summer of 1999 I awarded, in December of 1998, gave him a call and briefly appraised him the Manitoba Eco-Network Award of the Tembec situation, and asked if we for its “significant contributions to could meet in Winnipeg. To my surprise he agreed the protection and awareness of Manitoba's environment.” The meeting happened later that summer at a Winnipeg restaurant where By the summer of 1999 Manitoba myself, Gary Raven, Frank Dottori, was in fully in election mode. The CEO of Tembec, Bob Rae, Phil Fontiane, provincial election would be held AFN Grand Chief at the time, and Jack in September, and the Filmon Woodward, a well-known lawyer government had been publicly specializing in Aboriginal law all met. exposed for their involvement in a The outcome of that meeting was that vote rigging scandal in the Tembec would agree to withdraw previous election, that had been temporarily its application, for approval designed to bleed votes from the under the Manitoba Environment Act, to NDP. proceed with its expansion plans until sometime after the provincial election. March 2021 The Quest to Protect The East Side of Lake Winnipeg Page 4 Well the rest as they say was history. Filmon lost the election and Tembec never did get the opportunity to submit its application to proceed with expansion plans for the East side of Lake Winnipeg. This was the first big obstacle that both the Boreal Forest Network and the Anishinaabe Turtle Island Protectors managed to overcome in the quest to protect the East side of Lake Winnipeg. By no means would it be the last, as the looming Manitoba Hydro HVDC Bipole III transmission line issue was about to rise up above the horizon in 2000. Within a year of being elected the provincial NDP government, under Gary Doer's leadership, began the process of establishing the East Side Planning Initiative (ESPI). The ESPI brought together By this time there was a growing At the end of the meeting, I was various stakeholders with an interest by a number of very pulled aside by the Minister's aide interest in the East Side of Lake large, mostly US-based and asked if I might help with Winnipeg, as well as all of the foundations in funding efforts to First Nation communities on the protect more of Canada's boreal organizing a trip for the Minister East Side of Lake Winnipeg.