NmTC Elders Council reinstated with ceremony

A council of Elders who guide Naut’sa mawt Tribal Council have been welcomed back for another year with a ceremony. 

Members of the Elders Council were blanketed and honoured with a song during the tribal council’s Annual General Meeting in Richmond, B.C., in late January. 

NmTC Communications Liaison Edith … Read More

TFN receives $7.2M for housing project

Photo: Selina Robinson, B.C.’s housing minister, announced the new funding at Katzie Nation in late November. Photo courtesy of B.C. government.

Tsawwassen Nation has received $7.2 million in provincial funding that will go towards a new multi-family rental housing project. 

The grant will allow the … Read More

Healing totem pole unveiled in Victoria

Perry and Tom LaFortune. Photo: B.C. Ministry of Health.

By Cara McKenna 

A Coast Salish totem pole that was carved by two brothers from Tsawout First Nation in honour of their late mother has been unveiled in Victoria. 

The Crossing Cultures and Healing Pole now stands outside of the B.C. Ministry of Health’s headquarters … Read More

Confronting reconciliation myths: Kwul’a’sul’tun speaks at VIU

Photo: VIU

By Julie Chadwick

Years ago, Doug White III (Kwul’a’sul’tun) asked his late grandmother Dr. Ellen White (Kwulasulwut) what would be lost when there was no longer a number of people who could fluently speak their language.

What she … Read More

Lummi highlights orca preservation in Florida museum exhibit

Photo: Kristen Grace, Florida Museum

A new museum exhibit in Florida shines a light on endangered killer whales and their cultural importance to Coast Salish people in the Pacific Northwest. 

Whale People: Protectors of the Sea opened on Dec. 8 at the Florida Museum of Natural … Read More

U.S. Coast Salish leaders travel to Canada for NEB hearings

A group of U.S. Coast Salish leaders travelled to Victoria to testify at the National Energy Board’s oral evidence hearings on Nov. 28. 

Representatives from Lummi, Swinomish, Tulalip and Suquamish travelled across the border to present their concerns to Canada’s energy regulator alongside their Canadian relatives. 

… Read More

Stz’uminus elders describe orcas as ‘family’ at NEB hearings

By Cara McKenna 

When Pearl Harris of Stz’uminus First Nation was a child, she learned to see the killer whales who would pass by her territory as family. 

The elder said southern resident orcas would often come up to shore of Shell Beach, and she would watch and listen to them.  

With guidance from her grandmother, Harris learned … Read More

New NEB process for pipeline ‘flawed,’ leaders say

Photo: Coldwater Indian Band Chief Lee Spahan shares his concerns about the new NEB assessment.

Canada’s energy regulator is repeating the same mistakes when it comes to the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion, say leaders who are opposed to the project.

The … Read More

B.C. funds transition house beds in Snuneymuxw

Photo courtesy of Government of B.C.

The Snuneymuxw Youth and Family Society has been funded to operate 10 transition house beds as part of a larger B.C. government initiative to help women and children fleeing violence.

The province announced … Read More

Indigenous veterans honoured with ceremony

Indigenous veterans past and present were honoured in Coast Salish territory during a ceremony at a Vancouver cenotaph on Nov. 8.

Dozens of people marched on National Aboriginal Veterans Day from Main and Hastings to the Victory Square war memorial, … Read More