Kristen Villebrun and Wendy Bush hoped they wouldn't have to pray for Chedoke Creek, but four years after they first raised alarm about the water's condition, they were part of an Indigenous full moon ceremony to do just that. About 50 people showed up near Princess Point on the dark and frigid Monday evening for the monthly ceremony, which was particularly special as it focused on Chedoke Creek. The body of water that runs into Cootes Paradise had about 24 billion litres of sewage and storm water runoff leak into it due to a gate being left open.
A water operator in an Ontario First Nation is being nationally recognized for his hard work and dedication to his community. Jonathan Riberdy has been awarded the 2021 National First Nations Water Leadership Award for his work to make safe and clean drinking water a reality for Zhiibaahaasing First Nation in Ontario. The water leadership award was created in 2018 by Indigenous Services Canada.
Dozens of indigenous communities across Canada have still no access to drinking water more than a year into the coronavirus outbreak as the country’s liberal government has officially failed to deliver on its own five-year deadline to lift all drinking water advisories in First Nations reserves. Canada’s Auditor General Karen Hogan presented a report in February documenting the total failure of successive Canadian governments -- including Justin Trudeau’s -- to provide for Indigenous communities’ most basic needs, insisting that “Access to safe drinking water is a basic human necessity,” according to the US-based World Socialist Web Site (WSWS).
A non-profit group is working with a First Nation community in northeastern Ontario to become citizen scientists. Swim Drink Fish, with funding from Environment Canada, is continuing to set up citizen science water monitoring hubs. The group is now working with Zhiibaahaasing First Nation, located at the western end of Manitoulin Island on the northshore of Lake Huron. "We're trying to build a community of people around the Great Lakes who are working for swimmable, drinkable and fishable water," Mark Mattson, president of Swim Drink Fish said.
