Cheslatta Carrier Nation
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The Cheslatta Carrier Nation or Cheslatta T'En (pronounced chez-la-ta), of the Dakelh (pronounced ) or
Carrier people The Dakelh (pronounced ) or Carrier are the indigenous people of a large portion of the Central Interior of British Columbia, Canada. The "Carrier" name was derived from an English translation of ''Aghele'', the name from the neighbouring Sekani ...
(Ta-cullies, meaning "people who go upon water", whose traditional lands where originally where the Kitimat Kemano Project I was built, form a large portion of the Central Interior of present-day
British Columbia British Columbia (commonly abbreviated as BC) is the westernmost province of Canada, situated between the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains. It has a diverse geography, with rugged landscapes that include rocky coastlines, sandy beaches, ...
, Canada, is a
First Nation Indigenous peoples are culturally distinct ethnic groups whose members are directly descended from the earliest known inhabitants of a particular geographic region and, to some extent, maintain the language and culture of those original people ...
of the
Nechako River The Nechako River arises on the Nechako Plateau east of the Kitimat Ranges of the Coast Mountains of British Columbia, Canada, and flows north toward Fort Fraser, then east to Prince George where it enters the Fraser River. "Nechako" is an angl ...
at the headwaters of the Fraser River. The Nechako (/nəˈtʃækoʊ/) River was once the greatest tributary of the Fraser River, and the watershed was used by the Carrier people. For centuries the Cheslatta T'en hunted, fished and trapped there and were part of an ancient trade network called the
Grease Trail A grease trail is an overland trade route, part of a network of trails connecting the British Columbia Coast, Pacific coast with the British Columbia Interior, Interior in the Pacific Northwest. History Trails were developed for trade between ...
. The grease was actually eulachon oil.In the opening session of the Goldthorpe Inquiry into abuses in the Indian health system, in March 1980 in Alert Bay, seven elders ranging in age from 69 to 91 spoke at length of the healing qualities of traditional foods and herbs. In particular they "owed their survival to drinking oolachan oil" from the oolichan, or candlefish, a fatty Pacific coast smelt. The oil was a highly prized commodity grease trail and was carried in bentwood boxes that would often leak. It was named the Alexander Mackenzie Voyageur Route, then renamed the Nuxalk-Carrier Grease Trail to honour the guides. with the
Nuxalk The Nuxalk people ( Nuxalk: ''Nuxalkmc''; pronounced )'','' also referred to as the Bella Coola, Bellacoola or Bilchula, are an Indigenous First Nation of the Pacific Northwest Coast, centred in the area in and around Bella Coola, British Co ...
and Chilcotin. The Cheslatta village and Cheslatta Lake (''Tsetl'adak Bunk'ut'' - ″Peak Rock Lake″) flooded due to the construction of the
Kenney Dam Kenney may refer to: * Kenney (name) Places United States communities * Kenney, Illinois * Kenney, Texas Geographical features * Hotel Kenney, Rideau Lakes, Ontario, Canada * Kenney Dam, a hydroelectric dam on the Nechako River, British Co ...
. which created
Nechako Reservoir The Nechako Reservoir, sometimes called the Ootsa Lake Reservoir, is a hydroelectric reservoir in British Columbia, Canada that was formed by the Kenney Dam making a diversion of the Nechako River through a 16-km intake tunnel in the Kitimat Range ...
, in 1952. Most members now live on a dozen small scattered reserves just south of Francois Lake. In 2013 the Cheslatta Carrier Nation (CCN) "are based at Southbank, on the south shore of Francois Lake, south of Burns Lake (''Tselhk'azbunk'ut'' - ″hone lake″). They have eight reserves on , with all reserves located at least apart. They have 340 members, with 125 members living on reserve, although there is no central community. The band office and other community buildings are located on a reserve about two km south of the Southbank ferry dock." The population on reserve is 167 and the population off reserve is 163, with a total of 330 according to the CNN INAC Active Band list reported in the 2011-2012 Language Needs Assessment report.


Language

Cheslatta, locally called Dakelh, is a dialect of the
Carrier language The Dakelh (ᑕᗸᒡ) or Carrier language is a Northern Athabaskan language. It is named after the Dakelh people, a First Nations people of the Central Interior of British Columbia, Canada, for whom Carrier has been a common English name derive ...
of the Dene (Athabaskan) family of languages. "Carrier is the general term for a complex of Athabaskan dialects in central British Columbia, adjoining (but clearly distinct from) Babine on the northwest and Chilcotin on the south." Of the 330 members of the CCN, 8 are fluent Cheslatta speakers, 18 understand or speak it somewhat and 100 are learning speakers. Dakelh/Carrier is traditionally divided into Upper and Lower Carrier. Upper Carrier includes communities to the north of Fort St. James, around Stuart and Trembleur Lakes. Lower Carrier is spoken in communities in the south. Linguists argue that Lower Carrier should be split into two dialect groups, the Fraser/Nechako and the Blackwater. The Fraser/Nechako would include Prince George, Cheslatta, Stoney Creek, Nautley, and Stellakoh. The Blackwater group would include the Ulkatcho, Kluskus, Nazko, Red Bluff, and Anahim Lake.


Chief and councillors

Corrina Leween is Chief, and Hazel Burt and Ted Jack are Councillors (2015–2018). The Cheslatta Carrier Nation is represented by the British Columbia Assembly of First Nations (BCAFN), a Political Territorial Organization (PTO), a branch of the
Assembly of First Nations The Assembly of First Nations (AFN) is an assembly of Canadian First Nations (Indian bands) represented by their chiefs. Established in 1982 and modelled on the United Nations General Assembly, it emerged from the National Indian Brotherhood, wh ...
. The BCAFN represents the 203 First Nations in British Columbia.


Treaty process

The community, which is negotiating independently, has reached Stage 3 in the
BC Treaty Process The British Columbia Treaty Process (BCTP) is a Indigenous land claims in Canada#Comprehensive claims, land claims negotiation process started in 1993 to resolve outstanding issues, including claims to un-extinguished indigenous rights, with Br ...
.


History

"For centuries the Cheslatta T'en hunted, fished and trapped in the
Nechako River The Nechako River arises on the Nechako Plateau east of the Kitimat Ranges of the Coast Mountains of British Columbia, Canada, and flows north toward Fort Fraser, then east to Prince George where it enters the Fraser River. "Nechako" is an angl ...
(''Nechakoh'' - ″Blackwater People's River″) area at the headwaters of the Fraser River (''Lhtakoh'' - ″rivers within one another″), West Road River (Blackwater River) (''Tanilhtl'uz'' - ″muddy water″), and Bulkley Rivers (''Wet'sinkwha'' - "blue and green river", name of the
Wetʼsuwetʼen The Wetʼsuwetʼen ( ) are a First Nation who live on the Bulkley River and around Burns Lake, Broman Lake, and François Lake in the northwestern Central Interior of British Columbia. The endonym Wetʼsuwetʼen means "People of the Wa Dzun ...
, another branch of the Carrier people) as well as areas around Stuart (''Nak'albun'' - ″Mount Pope Lake″) Babine lakes (''Na-taw-bun-kut'' - "Long Lake") up to the borders of Bear Lake (''Sustoobunk'ut'', ᙐᔆᗜᗪᐣᗽᐪ - "black bear water lake", or ''Sustootibunk'ut'', ᙐᔆᗜᗠᗪᐣᗽᐪ - "black bear water trail lake"). To the east, Carrier traditional territory extended as far as the Rocky Mountains.″ Long before contact with Europeans, they fished for trout, char, kokanee and whitefish in the freshwater lakes and traded with neighbouring villages for sockeye and chinook salmon. In later years many Cheslatta people had large vegetable gardens and herds of cattle and horses for which they grew fields of timothy and clover. Some worked for local sawmills or ranchers and ran traplines to earn cash to buy supplies they could not produce themselves." In 1792–93 Nuxalk-Carrier guides led Alexander Mackenzie along the grease trail, a network of trails that were thousands of years old from the Fraser River to Bella Coola.


Flooding of traditional lands

In a major multi-authored interdisciplinary and multi-institution report entitled "Threats to Water Availability in Canada" published by Environment Canada and researched by
National Water Research Institute The National Water Research Institute (NWRI) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization, located in California, was founded in 1991. It is devoted to promoting the protection, maintenance, and restoration of water supplies through collaborative resea ...
, an entire section focused on the Nechako - Kemano Diversion as case study. In 1950 the B.C. government and the Aluminum Company of Canada (
Alcan Alcan was a Canadian mining company and aluminum manufacturer. It was founded in 1902 as the Northern Aluminum Company, renamed Aluminum Company of Canada in 1925, and Alcan Aluminum in 1966. It took the name Alcan Incorporated in 2001. During t ...
;
Rio Tinto Alcan Rio Tinto Alcan is a subsidiary of Rio Tinto, based in Montreal. It was created on 15 November 2007 as the result of the merger between Rio Tinto's Canadian subsidiary and Canadian company Alcan. It is the global leader of aluminium mining and ...
since 2008) through then-director Ray Edwin Powell entered into an agreement to facilitate the develop of a hydroelectric project that would support Alcan's new aluminum smelting industry at
Kitimat, British Columbia Kitimat is a district municipality in the North Coast region of British Columbia, Canada. It is a member municipality of the Regional District of Kitimat–Stikine regional government. The Kitimat Valley is part of the most populous urban distric ...
. The $500-million project at Kitimat was the largest public-private partnership ever introduced in Canada in 1951. British Columbia "signed over in perpetuity and at a nominal charge a huge area and much of its resource wealth-agricultural and park lands, water, forests and fish. All waters covered by the licence were to be diverted before the year 2000." Phase I "redirected flows of 115 cubic metres per second on average from the Nechako River (Fraser basin) to spill westward by tunnel through the Coast Mountains, a vertical drop 16 times higher than Niagara Falls, into the Kemano River basin." While the Kenney Dam was under construction and the Nechako Reservoir was filled, there was a 100% loss of flow in the upper Nechako River. In October 1952 the Nechako Reservoir started to fill. In 1954 the Kenney Dam was completed, creating a body long that covered . Alcan sent in a crew to build a stone cairn on the highest ground at the site of the village on Ootsa Lake just before it was flooded, and eventually a plaque was attached. Then Alcan restored 60% to 70% of the flow of the Nechako River "via a spillway that discharged, not from Kenney Dam but down the Cheslatta, a tributary of the Nechako. The comparatively large discharge down this small tributary scoured a deep channel in the unconsolidated sediments and deposited huge volumes of sediment in the upper Nechako. Due to a smaller dam constructed near the mouth of the Cheslatta, homes and a graveyard of the local Indian community were flooded. The community was forced to relocate on short notice to a new area and unfamiliar way of life, which led eventually to demands for redress of their losses." In 1993, the Government of Canada paid the CCN $7.4 million in a settlement for inadequate compensation in 1952.


Demographics

The Cheslatta Carrier Nation (CCN) now "have eight reserves on , with all reserves located at least apart. They have 340 members, with 125 members living on reserve."


Economic development


Cheslatta Forest Products 2001-

In 1996 the CCN were awarded salvage rights to trees submerged by the Kemano power project. In 2001, the CCN, Prince George-based Carrier Forest Products Ltd. and Oosta Resources Ltd. formed Cheslatta Forest Products. This three-way joint venture partnership was owned by a group of Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal residents from the Lakes Forest District, including six First Nations. Their $7.5 million sawmill at Ootsa Lake processed underwater salvage timber and timber killed by the mountain pine beetle.


Social, educational and cultural programs and facilities

The CCN completed a multimillion-dollar innovative water filtration system in 2004. The Cheslatta "worked with engineers on a proposal to pump water out of Francois Lake, run it through a water filtration system up to a water tower, and then gravity feed it to a mainline that would serve not only their community, but also the neighbouring Skin Tyee Band and Nee Tahi Buhn Band, as well as the non-native community." The Cheslatta Carrier Nation is constructing an online archive (pre- and post- flood).http://cheslatta.wordpress.com/


See also

*
Nechako Reservoir The Nechako Reservoir, sometimes called the Ootsa Lake Reservoir, is a hydroelectric reservoir in British Columbia, Canada that was formed by the Kenney Dam making a diversion of the Nechako River through a 16-km intake tunnel in the Kitimat Range ...
*
Kenney Dam Kenney may refer to: * Kenney (name) Places United States communities * Kenney, Illinois * Kenney, Texas Geographical features * Hotel Kenney, Rideau Lakes, Ontario, Canada * Kenney Dam, a hydroelectric dam on the Nechako River, British Co ...


Notes


Citations


References

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Detailed and illustrated
Popular Science ''Popular Science'' (also known as ''PopSci'') is an American digital magazine carrying popular science content, which refers to articles for the general reader on science and technology subjects. ''Popular Science'' has won over 58 awards, incl ...
article on the Kemano Hydro Project.\ * * * * * * This paper investigated loss of sense of place of deracinated peoples by examining the case of the Cheslatta T'En who were "forcibly removed from their ancestral lands in the 1950s so as to allow for the construction of a private hydroelectric dam by the Aluminum Company of Canada (Alcan)." * {{refend Dakelh governments History of British Columbia Nechako Country