The Dominion - water

"Stand With Us to Fight"

Tim McSorley — Wed, 28 Mar 2012 12:42:20 +0000

Hundreds protest Enbridge pipeline and oil tankers at Heiltsuk-led rally

VANCOUVER—Hundreds of people from First Nations, environmental and community organizations, and others from Vancouver and beyond, rallied against Enbridge's Northern Gateway pipeline and coastal oil supertanker traffic earlier today, filling the Vancouver Art Gallery grounds.

A march led by the Heiltsuk Nation of the Central Coast departed from the Coastal First Nations office at Granville and Hastings Streets and wound its way through the downtown business district to join another group waiting at the Vancouver Art Gallery. The rally marked the 23rd anniversary of the Exxon Valdez oil spill off the coast of Alaska, which spilled hundreds of thousands of barrels of oil on March 24, 1989.

"Only seven percent of that oil was cleaned up," said Coastal First Nations Executive Director Art Sterritt of the Exxon Valdez spill. "Our well-being as First Nations is dependent on our lands, on our waters.

“Our people, the Heiltsuk people, have always had a position: No oil tankers on the coast! That position has never changed,” Heiltsuk elder Edwin Newman said, addressing the rally. “We are pleading with our coastal neighbours to stand with us to fight this issue.”

“When we stand together, we are a powerful people,” added Newman, whose call for unity was echoed by speaker after speaker.

"We are Canada's energy union and we stand with you on this issue," Jim Britton, Western Region Vice President of the Communications, Energy and Paperworkers' Union (CEP) told the crowd. "We do not support Enbridge. We do not support Northern Gateway...This isn't just about oil. This is about us. This is about our communities."

If built, the proposed 1,200-kilometre Northern Gateway oil pipeline would transport a half-million barrels of tar sands bitumen from Alberta to Kitimat, BC. The proposed twin pipelines' 30-metre-wide right-of-way would cross hundreds of rivers, streams and watersheds along its route through numerous unceded Indigenous territories. The crude oil would then be transported on massive oil tankers through delicate coastal ecosystems and Indigenous territories and finally across the Pacific to Asian markets.

"The world that we have lived in for the past 10,000 years is shifting around us," Bill McKibben, founder of 350.org, an organization dedicated to building a global movement against climate change, told the rally, situating the coastal struggle against pipelines and tankers within the global climate justice movement. "The planet is starting to become unglued because we are raising the temperature."

"We know, we absolutely know that this fight is going to completely eclipse the [fight for] Clayoquot Sound," Grand Chief Stewart Phillip, President of the Union of BC Indian Chiefs said. "We know that this fight is going to intensify."

While the struggle against Northern Gateway has garnered massive support and international attention, it is not the only pipeline project facing opposition in the province. Grassroots Wet'suwet'en community activists have been resisting the proposed Pacific Trails natural gas pipeline that would connect to a new Liquefied Natural Gas port on the Central Coast. The project would traverse the unceded lands of many of the same First Nations opposing the Enbridge project. In its case, however, the elected leadership of several First Nations along the route are supporting the Pacific Trails project.

Another lesser-known pipeline project already runs through the lower mainland. The Kinder Morgan oil pipeline brings tar sands crude across the Rockies along its Trans Mountain pipeline to terminals in both Burnaby and Washington State. Only two months ago there was a spill in Abbotsford, BC, following a major oil spill at the Burnaby terminal site in 2007.

Kinder Morgan is expected to announce its expansion plans for the pipeline, according to Ben West, Healthy Communities Campaigner for the Wilderness Committee. The company is reportedly looking to increase the quantity of crude transported from 300,000 barrels per day to 600,000 or 700,000.

"Kinder Morgan has been trying to do this as quietly as possible," West told the rally. "We have to stand together to say no to all these projects!"

As the rally wound down after two hours in the rain, the loudest expressions of support were heard for 11-year-old Sliammon First Nation singer-songwriter Ta'Kaiya Blaney. She recalled going to the Enbridge office in Vancouver one year ago to express her opinion about the Northern Gateway pipeline.

"I was escorted out and I was told that if I didn't leave I would be charged for trespassing," Blaney recounted to the ralliers, who showed their support with enthusiastic cheers.

Before performing her song "Shallow Waters," Blaney told the hundreds gathered on the Monday afternoon of the message found in the song: "If we do nothing it will all be gone."

Sandra Cuffe is a writer and aspiring janitor currently living in Vancouver.

This article was originally published by the Vancouver Media Co-op.

Questions? Comments? Drop us a line: info@mediacoop.ca

Heiltsuk Nation elder Edwin Newma

Rally against pipelines at Vancouver Art Gallery

Oil Gateway

Tim McSorley — Fri, 23 Sep 2011 17:05:38 +0000

Stop the Flows is the working title for subMedia.TV's next project. Over the next five years we will document resistance movements that are working towards stopping the flows of hydro carbons, mineral extraction, natural resources and capital, through grassroots and underground organizing. We will publish our dispatches as we complete them with the goal of compiling them into a feature length documentary to be released on 2016.

In this dispatch we look at how members of the Unis’toten nation are pre-empting the construction of 4 pipelines through their traditional territories

To help make these reports a reality, please visit STOPTHEFLOWS.com

For more background on BC's oil infrastructure visit the links below:

Aboriginal groups in Canada challenge tar sands projects

Grassroots Gathering to Resist Proposed Pipelines

In BC, Pipes Spell Double Trouble

This video report was originally published by the Vancouver Media Co-op

Water is All of Us

dawn — Wed, 24 Aug 2011 09:35:52 +0000

Report from the fifth annual Keepers of the Water gathering

LAC BROCHET, MANITOBA—Words flowed like water from Indigenous Elders gathered at the fifth annual Keepers of the Water gathering in Lac Brochet, Manitoba, this August.

The gathering of the Keepers—an organization made up of of First Nations, environmentalists, and concerned people who want to protect the Arctic Ocean drainage basin—was hosted by the Northlands Denesuline First Nation. It stressed the importance of unity and action to protect waters from being polluted and poisoned.

With a population of fewer than a thousand people, Lac Brochet can be reached only by airplane or by water, and a delegation from Hatchet Lake, SK, took four days to canoe to the gathering. There were also various scholars, representatives, and leaders, including MLA Gerard Jennissen, who said “Water is a horrible enemy but a great friend.” Throughout the gathering, participants shared their thoughts and knowledge about the preciousness of water and how it might be better protected from human destructiveness.

Sam Gargan, who is Grand Chief of the Dehcho in the Northwest Territories and a co-founder of the first Keepers of the Water gathering in 2006, explained how De means river, and Ne means land, together making the word Dene, which signifies how the Dene people are defined by their reciprocal relationship with land and water.

Gargan also described how “western” concepts of democracy are historically derived from Indigenous cultures, and discussed how a holistic relationship with the earth can lead to the protection of both the land’s surface and subsurface. At a time when mining threatens the long-term well-being of future generations in many places, Nahanni Park stands as an example to emulate. Part of the Dehcho people's traditional lands, Nahanni Park began as 4766 square kilometers in 1972, and has since expanded to roughly 28,000 square kilometers through the efforts of the Dehcho people in the NWT. The park draws its name from the South Nahanni River, which feeds Canada's longest river, called the Deh Cho by the Dene and also known as the Mackenzie River.

The defining question for the gathering was centred around asking what this generation wants to pass on to future generations.

The history of industrial mining has shown over and over again—from Uranium City in northern Saskatchewan to Navajo homelands in the US—that mining jobs are temporary but that pollution remains long after the mines have closed.

For this reason, sustainable economic models are urgently needed. These may range from solar and wind projects to the protection of caribou habitat, which is crucial for the survival of Indigenous communities. Caribou are a traditional and essential food source for these communities. The well-being of the caribou depends on clean, healthy watersheds and lands.

It is challenging to think of water not merely as an external object in need of protection, but as that which literally constitutes our bodies and also lives, as it constantly moves within and through us, linking us to the watersheds that we are part of. This kind of thinking is key to water stewardship. It is demonstrated by Cree Elder D’Arcy Linklater's comment that when he refers to the water, he does not merely mean rivers and lakes, but women themselves.

The passionate words of First Nations elders were complemented by visitors like Dr. Radha D’Souza, who drew connections between Indigenous peoples in Canada and the struggles of India’s 67 million Indigenous people. D'Souza gave an overview of shifts that have been happening at the United Nations, and asked a critical question: are we serving the economy or is the economy serving us?

She also noted that there is a serious tension between the language that exists in declarations and the way they are actually implemented, which can undermine or even nullify the goals and values of the declarations.

Robert Patrick from the University of Saskatchewan noted the inequities that continue for First Nations communities. For instance, they have a boil water advisory rate that is two-and-a-half times higher than in non-First Nations communities. Patrick observed that a number of reserves have the wrong technologies for the water issues they face, such as infrastructure that is often too high-energy or high-maintenance for the community’s needs.

Patrick noted that building small can lead to better living. He suggested that considering a community's proper scale in conjunction with a long-term view that anticipates the effects of climate change (such as drastic weather extremes, and more unpredictability in the amount and timing of rains) will more deeply connect human societies to mindful watershed protection.

When the Keepers first met in 2006, they drafted a declaration that continues to resonate strongly. It reads:

“Water is a sacred gift, an essential element that sustains and connects all life. It is not a commodity to be bought or sold. All people share an obligation to cooperate to ensure that water in all of its forms is protected and conserved with regard to the needs of all living things today and for future generations tomorrow.”

It was heartening to witness that the Keepers are staying on track, guided by the waterways themselves, navigating the many dangers that face us today.

Rita Wong is a poet who lives on the unceded Coast Salish lands also known as Vancouver.

Canoes on the Lake

Dene Drummers

"The River Always Wins"

JustinL — Mon, 08 Aug 2011 09:04:44 +0000

1,500 take to the streets in Fredericton to oppose fracking.

FREDERICTON—Over 1,500 people from across New Brunswick and beyond marched through Fredericton on August 1 to demand an end to hydraulic fracturing (fracking) and shale gas exploration in the province. Concern over the effects that fracking may have on the province's water, for this generation and for those to come, brought out strong representation from the province's English, French, and First Nations communities.

The march wound its way through town, finishing at the Legislative Assembly, where a range of speakers addressed the peaceful but incensed crowd.

"The Wabanaki people are not here to celebrate New Brunswick today," said Alma, a representative of the Wabanaki Confederacy. "To me New Brunswick is just a government, nothing more. You see the flag flying up there?" she said, referencing the the Legislative Assembly where the provincial flag had been replaced by the Mohawk warrior flag. "That speaks the truth."

Central to the growing concern over fracking in New Brunswick is the province's newly-hatched, and largely one-sided, partnership with South Western Energy (SWN). SWN is not the only company looking to frack in New Brunswick, but the magnitude and scope of the Texas/Arkansas-headquartered company has the locals worried. Thanks to a March 2010 deal with the New Brunswick Department of Natural Resources, SWN holds exclusive license to explore 2,518,518 "net undeveloped acres" of New Brunswick. "Net undeveloped acres" is corporate jargon for "nature."

In return, SWN has promised to invest $47 million into the province over the next three years. While that might seem like a large amount, the untold millions in gas royalties that stand to flow out of the province make it look like small peanuts. As well, the very real potential for environmental disaster is difficult, if not impossible, to put into monetary terms.

Of course, there is always the perrenial promise of job creation in exchange for resource extraction. But Derek Telasco, for one, sees this as a low-hanging fruit not even worth picking.

"People are saying there's jobs," says Telasco, co-founder of Ban Fracking NB. "Like we're going to get these jobs here. First of all...we don't have the infrastructure for drilling like they do in Texas, Arkansas or Pensylvania...this is a new industry here, so what kind of jobs are going to be here? We don't have the people trained. You're going to get low-end, sweeper jobs, and clean-up crew. You'll be out there with a mop picking up the mess underneath, leaking. We're going to sell out our grandchildren's future in this province, we're going to take that kind of risk with our water?"

On June 23, 2011, the provincial government, in an attempt to placate the masses—and perhaps to save itself from being on the receiving end of a class-action lawsuit—unveiled a framework of regulations for potential frackers in the province. Judging by yesterday's turnout, the crowd was less than satistfied by Department of Natural Resources Minister Bruce Northrup and said regulations.

Northrup's regulations call for baseline testing for wells in close proximity to fracking sites, disclosure of the chemicals used when fracking and security bonds for potential household damage due to fracking. SWN, it should be mentioned, is currently facing, and has faced, class-action lawsuits in Arkansas and Pennsylvania. When dealing with the hundreds of millions in profits, however, security bonds for damaged households in New Brunswick are most likely acceptable losses to a company with the girth of SWN. It should also be mentioned that as natural gas prices continue to fall worldwide, SWN will most likely be continuing on an aggressive production schedule.

Telasco, for his part, fears the New Brunswick government is eager to move forward on this, attempting to get their fracking dreams off the ground before the public can catch on to the risks involved. The question of clean water is understandably an emotional one and public reaction across the province has at times been heated.

"My concern is that there's a number of issues that we're fighting against in New Brunswick." says Telasco. "One is a 25 per cent illiteracy rate. [SWN is] not fracking right now, they're seismic testing. And [the people are] getting really scared. What I'm worried about is that somebody is going to go too far and somebody's going to get shot. In my opinion we can't lose that moral high ground that we have by having a non-violent means of protest. When there's fracking trucks, we don't have to go and vandalize the fracking trucks."

Atlantic Canada's public concern over fracking is not limited to New Brunswick. Solidarity rallies were also held in Nova Scotia communities Inverness, Baddeck, and Truro; Charlottetown, PEI; and St. John's, Newfoundland. Indeed, as Hazel Richardson of the Sierra Club of Canada pointed out, many in the Atlantic region of Canada have been affected by fracking. It was recently revealed that the Nova Scotia-based Debert Waste Water Facility, owned by Atlantic Industrial Services (AIS), currently handles fracking wastewater from New Brunswick. While AIS representatives have assured the public that they are operating within their guidelines in handling fracking wastewater, this news was disconcerting to many, especially in light of the fact that Nova Scotia is undergoing its own environmental assessment of hydraulic fracking.

"There is a saying," says Richardson. "In a battle between the river and the rock, the river always wins. Not because it's stronger, but because it perseveres. The rock we face seems mountainous. The mining companies have deep pockets, and the government of our province seems so keen to snatch financial crumbs from the company plate that it is rushing into action that is threatening our land, the wildlife, and ourselves. All of Atlantic Canada has been or is being negatively impacted by hydraulic fracturing. Together Atlantic Canadians stand and say 'No to Shale Gas.'"

The "Trade" Agreement Ottawa and Nova Scotia Want Kept Secret

Martin Lukacs — Wed, 27 Jul 2011 09:06:28 +0000

Packed room hears Canada-Europe trade negotiations denounced

HALIFAX—A standing-room-only crowd packed a Halifax meeting room on a summer night to hear about a secret.

Two national speakers, Maude Barlow of the Council of Canadians and Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) President Paul Moist, provided a harrowing account of the Harper government's "trade" negotiations with Europe that they said will transfer decision-making power from local governments to multinational corporations.

The vehicle for this wholesale corporate power grab is the Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA), said the speakers.

Unlike the earlier Free Trade Agreement and North American Free Trade Agreement, CETA would reach into provincial and municipal policy-making and purchasing, Moist said. It would seriously threaten local job creation and "Buy-Local" policies; it would encourage privatization of Canada's drinking water and waste-water services (no matter what local citizens wanted); and it would cause prescription drug costs to skyrocket by at least $2.8 billion per year.

CETA is essentially a corporate bill of rights which puts companies and their profits first and the wishes of local citizens last, said Barlow. For example, European corporations could seek compensation for business lost as a result of any government regulation or policy. This includes banning a carcinogenic additive to gasoline (this has already happened under existing "trade" deals) or paying millions to a pulp and paper company that abandoned Newfoundland and Labrador.

"We have nothing against trading with Europe and much of our trade is now free or becoming free of tariffs," said Moist. "But this deal goes well beyond trade issues into interfering with how local people can make decisions about how to run their communities."

A Nova Scotia speaker, Mark Austin, Executive Director of the Rural and Coast Communities Network, added a number of concerns. "This deal has huge implications for Nova Scotia, particularly rural areas, yet we have heard nothing about it," Austin said. It would likely result in overfishing, and would threaten food sovereignty through attacks on agricultural policies such as farm marketing boards, he added.

And buy-local initiatives, like one Austin is involved with in Truro, could become impossible.

"While there might be small short-term gains in trade with Europe, you have to give up control of your long-term local economic prospects. It's like the Canucks playing in Boston—you can score one goal, but you have to give up five."

CUPE Nova Scotia President Danny Cavanagh, who chaired Tuesday's event, said CETA negotiations would resume in Brussels on July 10. Prime Minister Harper hopes to sign a completed deal by the end of the year. Premier Darrell Dexter and other provincial premiers, who also need to sign off on the deal, are part of Canada's little-publicized discussions.

Barlow said that while it may be unrealistic to expect a provincial government not to sign the agreement, she hopes that public pressure motivates premiers to drive a harder bargain and seek exemptions from the most damaging aspects of the currently proposed deal.

Despite the devastating potential impact, the speakers noted that the Nova Scotia government has done nothing to alert citizens of what is at stake. Moist said that the Nova Scotia and Manitoba governments have agreed to talk in private with CUPE and the Council of Canadians research staff about the negotiations, but no consultations with the general public are planned.

The European Parliament receives regular status reports in public on the CETA negotiations, Moist said. "Why can't Canadians get such reports?"

Dartmouth MP Robert Chisholm, the federal NDP trade critic, was at the meeting, as was Halifax NDP MP Megan Leslie. No provincial politicians attended.

"It's not too late to stop the deal," Barlow said.

The speaking event was part of a national campaign entitled, "Canadian communities are not for sale.” More information is available as part of a “CETA toolkit” at http://cupe.ca/ceta, or at www.canadians.org.

This article was originally published with the Halifax Media Co-op.

Jim Guild, of Halifax, recently retired from a staff rep. position with the NS Government and General Employees Union (NSGEU) and has been active of late with the Halifax Media Co-op.

Barlow CETA2

Water Inspires Strange Bedfellows

Moira Peters — Wed, 13 Apr 2011 05:07:10 +0000

How a Colombian city united against gold greed

BUCARAMANGA, COLOMBIA—Spirits were high last month among students, environmentalists, businesspeople, and politicians as the news came in that Greystar Resources had revoked its application for a large-scale open-pit gold mine in the mountains of northeastern Colombia.

But just twelve hours later, Greystar’s intentions became clear—it was withdrawing that application to bring in a new one for a redesigned, underground mine.

The short-lived but significant victory for those against the mine was possible thanks to the tireless efforts of the broadest, most diverse coalition in Colombia’s recent history. This coalition brought together an engineer’s association, committed student activists, the head of the local business federation, NGOs, teachers, environmentalists, and water utility employees.

Foreign investments in Colombia’s mining sector grew slowly in the 1990s, but in the eight years of former President Alvaro Uribe’s regime it skyrocketed in part due to a perception of safer exploration conditions. Even the Canadian government showed interest in making Colombia prime for investment needs by having the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) draft Colombia’s mining law of 2001, granting generous privileges to foreign companies. Uribe’s disciple, current President Juan Manuel Santos, has made resource extraction a centerpiece of his economic plan, deeming it the main “motor” of development and plans to follow the lead of Chile and Peru, two truly mining-oriented countries.

Santos’ strategy includes generous tax breaks to mining companies and modifying laws to be more “investor friendly.” It also involves persecuting traditional small miners—some who lack a mining title—aligning them with the neo-paramilitaries and guerrillas who mine illegally to fund their “dirty” work. Mainstream media plays into this dynamic by focusing on illegal mining but remaining silent about the large-scale corporate takeover of Colombia’s resources. Currently, 40 per cent of Colombia´s entire area is under mining permits, some of it on environmentally protected land or Indigenous and Afro-Colombian communal territories.

Into this mining binge came Greystar Resources, a Vancouver-based junior exploration company. (Junior exploration companies typically explore potential mining sites, deal with permit processes, and then sell their acquisition to an actual mining company, making financial speculation their real business.) Among Greystar’s investors are the International Financing Corporation—the World Bank’s private financing arm, and JP Morgan.

The company has mineral rights over 74,000 acres of land in the mountains of California and Vetas, two small and remote towns forgotten by the government, where Greystar has invested in infrastructure and had brought promises of employment and progress. Many locals in that area badly want the mine.

The project is just 40 kilometers northeast of Bucaramanga, Colombia’s fifth-largest city. Greystar plans to dig out an estimated nine million ounces of gold, making its mine one of the largest gold deposits in South America.

But that gold sits under the Santurban paramo, a tropical version of high moorlands. This unique ecosystem supplies water for Bucaramanga and 21 towns. The proposed use of cyanide at the Greystar mine caught the attention of the region’s citizens, who see it as a major threat to their “liquid of life” source: water. In fact, mineral extraction was legally banned in paramos in the amendment to article 34 of the Colombian Mining Law in 2010.

Besides the national effort to render all paramos mine-free zones, various environmental organizations in the Bucaramanga area worked for years to have Santurban declared a protected area, which would exclude mining, logging and cattle grazing from its grounds. More recently, opposition to the mining project gained ground when university students and other environmentalists joined the cause, concerned not only about the threat to their local water supply, but also about the sovereignty and long-term economic implications this mine represented within the national mining policy. They realized that the need for water was shared by everyone, regardless of their political views, and they framed their anti-mining campaign through water’s unifying lens.

The coalition started growing and taking a new shape when the municipal water utility workers union joined. Then they sought support from the state assembly leadership, where their calls landed on receptive ears; the assembly’s president, a member the leftist Democratic Alternative Pole (Polo) party, publicly denounced the mine.

Following this victory, the economic federations of Bucaramanga, which, besides understanding the intrinsic environmental value of the Santurban paramo, came to the conclusion that damaging the city’s water source would have a more negative financial impact in the long term than the ephemeral gains of mining. The state engineers association also opposed the project. At this point, it became clear the general public sentiment in the region was that water was worth more than gold.

“Take to the streets in support of your treasure, the Santurban paramo,” called out members of the coalition during a public demonstration on February 24, 2011. Previous protests had seen low turnouts, but the issue became so well-known and the opposition so diverse, that over 30,000 Bucaramangans marched in their streets, petitioning the Environment Ministry to deny Greystar’s license application. Around this time other segments of the government, including the Attorney General, publicly denounced the mine.

With all eyes on Bucaramanga, the ministry held a public hearing on Greystar’s case. There was a clear division between the small crowd from California and Vetas that was bused there by the company to support the project, and the large, mostly urban majority opposing the mine.

The majority of politicians, most prominently the state’s governor, explicitly called to shut down the project for its technical flaws and risks it posed to the community. Tensions ran high as the hearing progressed. Two attendees started a fight, and the ministry ended the hearing early. Media coverage focused on the fight rather than on the near unanimous resistance to the gold mine.

The hearing was a public disgrace to the company, whose stock value dropped 30 per cent. To top it all off, Colombia’s energy minister and even Serafino Locono, a prominent oil-and-mining CEO, highlighted Greystar project’s flaws at a miner’s conference in Toronto.

Greystar decided to preempt the environment ministry’s decision on the company’s license application, and withdraw its request for the mining operation, only to announce later that Greystar was reconfiguring its project to “address the concerns of the community.”

This company is just one of a group of businesses after Santurban’s gold. Its counterparts include Galway Resources and Ventana Gold Corp, recently purchased by energy billionaire Eike Batista. The success of these companies will likely be impacted by Greystar’s fate.

Laura Galvis, a student member of the anti-mining coalition, says that the group’s lack of hierarchy, its clarity in its position on the issue, and its ability to take an angle that resonated with everyone were essential to the recent success. “It’s not just about the environment, it’s about our very survival,” she explained.

Coalition founders worked hard to bring everyone to the table, and found a common point of interest with their traditional political opponents in the belief that the public’s right to clean water takes precedence over private interests. Through educational campaigns and public demonstrations, they slowly gained ground.

This broad alliance against the mining project is not quite a movement, for it rose to meet a temporary need, and its members have little in common beyond their rejection of the mining operations. The coalition is a something of an interim union aided by current elections, with politicians seeking supporters. Whatever its nature, this grassroots experience opened the door to a multi-party dialogue rarely seen in Colombia.

The most committed segment of the coalition—the students and environmentalists who oppose large-scale multinational mining in general—want to move the argument beyond the threat to Bucaramanga’s water supply. They see a need to adapt to the reconfiguration proposed by Greystar, and to deepen the debate to include other harmful effects the mine would bring, such as a deterioration of the area’s agricultural web and the loss of a local supply of gold for Bucaramanga’s thriving jewelry industry.

Publicly, the coalition’s success in bringing the Santurban case into the eye of the media hurricane has forced Greystar to change its strategy. Whether the coalition is able to stop the mining project compltely and protect its beloved paramo remains to be seen.

Natalia Fajardo is a mining consultant for Cedetrabajo, a political analysis institute in Colombia. Cedetrabajo is a member of Reclame, Colombia’s national network of organizations facing large-scale mining.

This article was originally published by Toward Freedom.

Bedfellows.paramo

bedfellows.water

Water to Mine

Moira Peters — Wed, 06 Oct 2010 05:07:19 +0000

Goldcorp’s Penasquito project in Mexico robs semi-desert region of precious resource

ZACATECAS, MEXICO—Five years ago a new neighbour arrived in Mazapil, Mexico, promising employment, medical services and general development for the local peasant communities as it hoped to develop one of the world’s largest gold mines. The newcomer—Canadian mining company Goldcorp Inc—built its mine but has yet to honour its promises to the thousands of people of Mazapil. Particularly for the residents of Cedros, Las Palmas and El Vergel—communities adjacent to the massive industrial complex—hope for a brighter future has dimmed.

In fact, Goldcorp’s Penasquito Mine has turned out to be a troublesome addition to the community, guzzling the municipality's scarce water sources, while its most significant contribution has been contamination and social division.

“Even though it has been a mining town by tradition, [Mazapil] has never been prosperous. Its population has managed to survive off agriculture and the raising of livestock,” according to an April 2010 article in the local paper, El Diario de Coahuila. The ejido system still prevails in this part of the country. It consists of community members, known as the ejidatarios, sharing a common landholding, both for agriculture and residence.

"We have had a very hard life and struggled enormously to upkeep this ejido," says Hernandez Herrera. "We have already suffered so much, and now, this monster comes to devastate our territories. What will we do once the water runs out? And it is clear that it will run out! Because in every place where a mine establishes itself, the water eventually runs out."

James Rodriguez is an independent documentary photographer based in Guatemala. He authors mimundo.org, where a version of this photo essay was originally published.

Penasquito.Flowers

Penasquito.Doll

Penasquito.Farmer

Penasquito.Kitchen

Penasquito.Sign

Penasquito.Irrigation

Penasquito.Armando

Penasquito.Dudes

Penasquito.Mine Piles

Penasquito.Mine Truck

Waves of Controversy Continue on BC Lakes

Moira Peters — Mon, 04 Oct 2010 05:35:07 +0000

Mt. Milligan mine in Northern BC far from a done deal

With all eyes on Tetzan Biny (Fish Lake) in central BC and the looming threat of government approval of Taseko's proposed Prosperity Mine, the proponents of the Mt. Milligan mine in northern BC have managed to avoid public scrutiny. But although it's stayed below the radar, the Mt. Milligan project could turn out to be just as controversial.

Before it was called Mt. Milligan, the area where the proposed open pit mine would be located was known to the Nak'azdli people as Shus Nadloh. It is a sacred area and an important watershed. Even so, Thompson Creek Metals, the mine proponent, makes the claim that the company can restore the area after mining, and replace fish habitat in the meantime by building reservoirs. The same claim is made by Taseko with respect to its proposed Prosperity Mine.

Building and operating the proposed Mt. Milligan mine near Prince George would mean turning a two-kilometre-long fish-bearing creek into a waste dump for potentially acid-leaching rock. The move to use the King Richard Creek Valley for waste disposal would result in almost three hundred million tonnes of waste rock being dumped into the creek, eliminating fish and marine life.

In a move hailed by local newspapers as a "breakthrough," the McLeod Lake Indian Band struck a revenue-sharing deal with the province for the Mt. Milligan mine. According to Black Press' bclocalnews.com, the McLeod Lake Band would receive as much as $38 million over the 15-year life of the copper and gold mine.

The McLeod Lake Band are Tse’khene peoples. The band independently affiliated with Treaty 8 in 2000. Treaty 8 was originally created in 1899 around the time of the gold rush; by signing the treaty, aboriginal title over land is ceded in exchange for "reserve lands, and other benefits," according to BC's Ministry of Aboriginal Relations and Reconciliation's website.

But diverting dollars to the McLeod Lake Band doesn't guarantee the project a green light.

The Nak'azdli Band is a member of the Carrier Sekani Tribal Council (CTSC), which pulled out of the BC Treaty Commission in 2006.

"We're not opposed to the project per se, but we want to work with the company and also with the province if we can get there," Chief Fred Sam of the Nak'azdli told the Vancouver Media Co-op in a phone interview.

Neither the Nak'azdli nor the CSTC have ceded their lands to British Columbia, or to Canada.

"We have... ongoing concern about the environment, and just the way things are being handled.... We're not happy with environmental process," he said.

The Mt. Milligan mine is slated to destroy King Richard Creek. Terrane has already received provincial approval of the environmental assessment.

Though past press releases from the Nak'azdli have signaled strong resistance to the Mt. Milligan mine, Sam says his community is waiting for the BC government to provide more information about the project and the possible benefits to the Nak'azdli before making any kind of decision on whether they'll support the mine.

"Once we get something from BC, then we'll present it to our community members, and we want them to say 'yea' or 'nay,'" said Sam, noting the possibility that this vote could happen within a few months.

The Halfway River First Nation and the West Moberly First Nation are also located near the proposed mine site.

Denver-based Thompson Creek Metals Company acquired Vancouver-based Terrane Metals Corp. in July 2010. The company has already begun building roads into the Mt. Milligan mine area, and plans to invest over $827 million in the proposed mine and the mill.

According to Thompson Creek Metals, the proposed open pit mine contains 2.1 billion pounds of copper and six million ounces gold, and would provide 400 direct jobs over 22 years.

Existing controversy around the Mt. Milligan mine is buried in forward-looking statements on the company's website. But if the Nak'azdli people are forced to stand up and protect Shus Nadloh and King Richard Creek, the facts on the ground—namely, the uncertainties around rights and title—may suddenly come into relief.

Dawn Paley is a journalist in Vancouver. This article was originally published by the Vancouver Media Co-op.

King Richard Creek

Algae Blooms Controversy

hillarybain — Mon, 10 May 2010 05:48:09 +0000

Nova Scotian mink industry blamed for water woes

HALIFAX—Tensions are running high in Yarmouth County. A proposal for a lakeside mink ranch near Carleton, Nova Scotia has resulted in a call for the provincial government to declare a moratorium on the establishment of new lake- and riverside farming developments.

Residents are worried their lake will be condemned to the same fate as many other water-bodies in the Carleton River watershed, which have been overrun by blue-green algal blooms.

“The pollution is so bad," says Carlene MacDonald, a Carleton resident. "The mink breeders choose to use 100 kilometres of river systems as their toilet and the government allows it by not responding.”

Blue-green algae, known as cyanobacteria, have overtaken a number of lakes in the region. Possible contributing factors include faulty lakeside septic systems and run-off containing agro-industrial fertilizers, but many believe the primary source is manure, urine, offal, caustic cleaning liquids and fly control chemicals from riverside mink ranches in neighbouring Digby County.

One and a half million minks are raised in Nova Scotia each year on almost 80 mink farms, according to the CBC. The majority of those mink farms are located in Digby and Yarmouth Counties. In 2006, Nova Scotia ranked first in the country for mink farming, with 49.8 per cent of the country’s mink, according to Statistics Canada.

“Fur, mainly from mink farming, is one of the fastest growing agricultural sectors in NS, and currently represents approximately $64 million in farm cash receipts,” states the Nova Scotia Agriculture Business Plan.

In October, Yarmouth County Municipal Council voted to amend a municipal land-use bylaw, increasing, from 328 to 500 feet, the required minimum set-back distance from lakes and rivers for buildings and manure storage facilities used in conjunction with fur ranches, and hog and fowl farms.

In response to the bylaw amendment, the Nova Scotia Mink Breeders Association and a group of Yarmouth-area livestock farmers filed an appeal with the Nova Scotia Utility and Review board. At the request of the appellants, the hearing has been postponed twice since February, most recently on March 30, and a new date has yet to be announced.

The Nova Scotia Federation of Agriculture (NSFA) has sided with industry against the bylaw change. The NSFA was initially named among the appellants but has since changed tactics and is now coupled with the NS Mink Breeders Association to jointly present at the eventual hearing. Donna Langille, operations manager of the NSFA, said the reason for jointly presenting “was that we felt if we combined our resources [with the NS Mink Breeders Association] into a collective effort we would have a better standing.”

In a more recent example of "collective effort," NS Minister of Agriculture John MacDonell introduced a bill to the provincial legislature on April 29 that would require fur ranchers to obtain a site approval permit before being administered their operating license and also would require they have an environmental management plan in place. The bill was drafted by the Department of Agriculture with input from the NS Mink Breeders Association.

MacDonald calls the bill a "scam" and another example of closed-door policy making which fails to represent the concerns of affected residents.

The blue-green alga that is flourishing in many Yarmouth County lakes is a toxin-generating microscopic plant that thrives in water containing high levels of phosphorus and nitrogen. The algae's prevalence has raised concerns regarding health and safety, property values, local ecologies, and the proper regulation of industry.

In July, 2009, Camp Wapomeo, a YMCA summer camp for local youth that had held its water recreations on the same lake in Yarmouth Country for 81 consecutive years, had to relocate their activities due to the algae and consequent safety concerns. Camp director Kathleen Whyte stated publicly that the algae’s growth is becoming more apparent each year and said she is inclined to attribute declining camp registration to parental concerns over health risks.

Randy Cleveland is a member of the Tusket River Environmental Protection Agency (TREPA), a group comprised of residents and concerned citizens from Carleton. TREPA has conducted its own research and investigation into the community’s water troubles.

Cleveland points to the fact that Nova Scotia’s mink and fur farms are only subject to recommended guidelines for reducing environmental risk in their operations, meaning they are self-regulating entities. He says Carleton needs "bylaws so the municipality would have recourse when it comes to establishing and enforcing regulations for mink and fur farms.”

In its mission statement and progress report entitled Environmental Performance of the Agricultural Sector in Nova Scotia 2009: A Report Card, the Nova Scotia Federation of Agriculture acknowledges that “manure management in areas of livestock concentration has to be improved,” and that “the mink sector, in particular, is primarily located in an area with a small cropland base, reducing alternatives to effectively manage mink manure and other wastes close to mink farms.”

The Report also states, however, that self-regulation is working. "Nova Scotia’s environmental acts and regulations support [environmentally sustainable farming practices] by encouraging compliance and by establishing a culture of self-regulation, minimizing the need for a harsh regulatory approach.”

Cleveland disagrees: “The waste problem has been acknowledged and the ecological consequences are now apparent, but the culture of self-regulation is not effectively operating. The provincial acts and regulations are either too broad to be useful or not being properly enforced.”

MacDonald agrees: "The pollution is so bad. I’m sure if more people could be made aware of the situation they would scream 'Pollution!’ along with us.”

Steven Wendland is a writer and filmmaker from Harmony, Nova Scotia.

This article was originally published by the Halifax Media Co-op.

Blue Green Algae

Sloans Lake

Concerns

Paula LaPierre — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 15:45:41 +0000

The Dialogue Denied Us

Case Closed?

Moira Peters — Fri, 20 Nov 2009 06:20:53 +0000

Site 41 resistance seeks revocation of environmental permit

WATERLOO, ON—The “People’s Fire” has been allowed to burn to ashes at the 150-day-old protest camp on 2nd Concession Road in Simcoe County, across from the proposed Site 41 landfill development 45 kilometres east of Blue Mountain, Ontario.

Site 41 sits on top of the Alliston aquifer, which contains some of the world’s purest groundwater and is connected with water sources across Southern Ontario, including Georgian Bay and the Oak Ridges Moraine.

For the protesters, many small victories have been achieved; still, this community demonstrates vigilance in its efforts to ensure a landfill is never built on the property.

September 22, 2009 will remain lodged in the memories of everyone involved in the Site 41 struggle as the day Simcoe County Council voted 26-3 in favour of cancelling the proposed garbage dump project.

However, those who remained encamped until October 20 (when they decided to shut down the protest camp for pre-winter agricultural preparations) note that while the current project has been called off, Council voted 22-7 against a motion to have the Ministry of the Environment’s Certificate of Approval (CofA) rescinded. The defeat of this second motion raises doubts about Council’s sincerity in their disapproval of the controversial dump project.

A communiqué from those who kept vigil at the site after the Sacred Fire was allowed to burn down in September was printed in a recent edition of the Tekawennake News. It declared: “The struggle has been so long, so hard and the most current victory so tangible, so close, that it seems unforgivable to cast any doubt on the enthusiasm so freely offered by the media and politicians.”

The letter continues, “First and most pressing, the CofA is still in effect and its power cannot be underestimated... This is a very real danger.”

Rejecting the current CofA would force any newly-proposed developments to undertake a new environmental impact assessment process. This was a process which, for this contested garbage dump development, took more than 20 years to complete, and was loaded with well-documented political pressure. By not annulling the CofA, Council leaves open the possibility for future development of the site—either for the County or a private developer who purchases the land.

Those writing from the People’s Fire insist they will continue to protest, as their communiqué states, “Until such a time as the Certificate of Approval is revoked for good.”

They acknowledge that, in the face of massive public relations spending by the County, they "need more than ever to maintain a strong presence and not to suddenly fade away in the face of our first victories.” They warn that “there is a very real danger of privatization...” and that without unrelenting pressure, another 30-year-long battle against development could take place, “This time at the hands of a faceless, multinational corporation instead of a local, elected County Council.”

Council has budgeted $250,000 for public relations consultations in an effort at “cleansing the fallout of the Site 41 debacle,” wrote Travis Mealing of the Midland Mirror.

While the debate around the PR costs continues, County environmental services director, Rob McCullogh, insists that restoring the land that was disrupted due to construction of garbage holding cells would be too expensive. The high-end estimate for recovery at the site is $368,000.

Refusing restoration means damage which occurred, according to the Council of Canadians, when cell construction commenced in violation of County Council approval processes, will not be reversed.

County Warden, Tony Guergis, maintains that the County no longer seeks to build a landfill on the site. However, Guergis’ sincerity is also being called into question; soon after he was elected, Guergis changed his stark opposition to the dump to a position of strong support. Meanwhile, County CAO Mark Aitken recently asked, in reference to removing the infrastructure that was built to support a dump site, “Why would [the County] remove all those things when you’re not sure if they have a use in the future?”

While the protest camp itself is no longer active, the campaigns for ecological and social justice continue. The "Restore and Revoke" campaign is working toward having the CofA cancelled and ensuring that the land is restored to a state which is as near its pre-disruption state as possible. A campaign is also underway to have the mischief and intimidation charges dropped for the 17 protesters arrested at Site 41. Only Indigenous protesters were charged with intimidation.

United by the responsibility of local environmental and community protection, and by the direct actions they took to protect the land and the water from the project that the Senior Advisor on Water to the President of the UN General Assembly, Maude Barlow, calls “ill conceived,” the Site 41 resistance vows to persevere until the permanent restoration and protection of this precious land is achieved.

Dan Kellar is a geography PhD student in Waterloo and an analytical banner painter with AW@L.

Site 41 Garbage Drink Cropped

As Global Citizens We Should All Care About Water

Paula LaPierre — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 17:39:35 +0000

For the Water

dru — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 05:52:40 +0000

Opposition to Site 41 unites Natives, farmers

SIMCOE COUNTY, ON—It has been nearly four months since a group of Anishinabe women from Beausoleil First Nation set up a protest camp across the road from a construction site where a new garbage dump is being built. More than 20 years have passed since members of the local agricultural community started the fight to protect what has become known as the world’s purest water.

Tomorrow, August 25, Simcoe County Council will meet, and the agenda includes a vote on a one-year moratorium on development of Dump Site 41. Many Canadians outside the county are familiar with Site 41 because of recent public protests.

Mark Calzavera, the new Council of Candians (COC) organizer for Ontario-Quebec, says, “Ninety-nine per cent of the work that I’ve done has been on Site 41.”

"We’ve really been putting a full court press on the issue because the time frame on the issue is very, very critical," he adds. "The construction is happening now and the people that were there needed support right away.”

The proposed garbage dump is located a few kilometers from the town of Elmvale and barely 30 kilometres from the Beausoleil First Nation reserve on Christian Island in Georgian Bay. The location covers 20.7 hectares of land, is surrounded by productive farmlands and sits directly above the Alliston aquifer. Site 41 has been a contentious development since 1979, when the North Simcoe municipalities started researching garbage dump development options. The county has been dewatering the aquifer as part of preparations for the site, which is slated to receive garbage as soon as possible.

The COC, like the local community, is focused on fighting Site 41 through the system. “From our perspective, what we wanted to do, and what we’ve always said, is that we were looking for a political solution bringing a vote back to council...on whether the dump site should go ahead or not, or whether to issue a moratorium until some of the outstanding questions could be answered,” says Calzavera.

COC lawyers discovered that the site had only received authorization for preliminary work, not for the cell construction. In other words, they had permission to start developing the site, but not to dig the hole the garbage would eventually go in. “They were never authorized to do that, in fact, they were specifically told not to do it by the folks in [Simcoe County] council.” Cell construction began anyway.

During a two-week stay of court in which COC lawyers were awaiting a ruling on the legality of the site, the courts and the Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) put on the pressure at Site 41, arresting 10 people between August 2 and 10.

The resulting publicity means that “far more people...understand what is going on,” explains Calzavera.

Police were once again used to clear the shoulder-to-shoulder protesters from in front of the access gates on August 18, and six more people were arrested.

***

The initial environmental review for Site 41 ended in 1989 with a provincial Environmental Review Board rejecting the project. According to Steve Ogden, a local farmer and member of the Community Monitoring Committee (CMC), in 1990 the Peterson government forced re-opening of discussion on Site 41, leading to a provisional Certificate of Approval (CoA) being granted for the project in 1998. Ogden claims that political pressure led to the project being approved, despite known environmental impacts.

One of the provisions of the approval required the CMC to “serve as a focal point for the collection, review and exchange of information relevant to both county and local concerns in connection with the landfill site.” By the end of 2001, two applications for review of the CoA, based on groundwater concerns, were dismissed by the MoE, and in 2003, hydrological consulting company Jagger Hims Ltd (now owned by GENIVAR), which the county hired, created a hydrogeological evaluation of the site using open source computer software Modflow.

The CMC has been denied access to data from the computer model that alleges that Site 41 is ecologically sound. Ogden filed a freedom of information request in 2006 after the final approval that year, despite concerns from Ontario’s Environmental Commissioner. Jagger Hims Ltd argues that the models contain “proprietary information” and still refuses to release the information—which Ogden points out is "a violation of the CoA, and unfortunately the OPP can’t force the MoE to follow the law. I’m not sure who does, because from what I have witnessed, they are not following the rules.”

Vicki Monague, a single mother from Beausoleil First Nation and spokesperson for the protest camp, says of the MoE, “Ultimately, I think the issue is that they are looking more at economy rather than ecology or environment.”

Monague, who was arrested and charged with mischief and intimidation, was banned from returning even to the legal protest camp. She links the direct action taken by herself and others, action considered illegal by the state, to positive social change: “This is actually a really great thing that has happened... the fact that we are able to impact and expose [the corruption] for what it is, and hopefully promote change within the system.”

Mohawk environmentalist Danny Beaton is one of five First Nations people who have been charged in connection with Site 41—he is the only non-local arrested thus far. However, it is not only Indigenous people who have been targeted for arrest by the OPP. Members of the local agricultural community have also been charged in connection with attempts to stop Site 41.

Keith and Ina Wood are 82 and 76 years old, respectively. Calzavera describes Ina Wood as “a saint.” Monague describes the couple as “people who have never even had a parking ticket... law abiding citizens who had lost their faith in the legal system and the political system.”

The Woods—like Monague, Beaton and the 12 others—are facing charges of mischief and are living under bail conditions. Monague says that the example set by the Woods “should inspire people to stand up and use their voice, and to protect what is theirs and to protect their heritage.”

On the eve of the hundredth day of the protest camp, Monague emphasized how their fight has highlighted the extent to which taking action to protect the land and water is not only a fight for First Nations.

“This is also a heritage territory for those families out there that are fighting Site 41 as well. Some of their farmlands have been there for up to 250 years, so this is now a land that we all share.” She continues, “It has gone beyond land claims and treaty rights and aboriginal rights... To protest, to protect the world’s purest water is a right that everybody has and that everybody should stand for.”

***

Corporate industrial giant GENIVAR also owns Henderson Paddon, the firm that provides landfill design and operations services to Simcoe County. This clear conflict of interest was highlighted recently in court when it was revealed that county officials defied a provincial Privacy Commissioner’s order to release the groundwater model, and have now been compelled to take actions to make the data public.

The information from the Freedom of Information inquiry, and issues around the criminalization of protesters, will also be discussed at the council meeting on August 25. It appears that through direct action, communities have come together to force local politicians to at least consider taking environmental protection seriously.

Monague notes that “this is really the first time ever in this area that non-Natives and Native people have stood together side-by-side.”

Calzavera adds, “I think one of the key reasons that the two groups have gotten along so well is that there is a tremendous amount of respect for the hard work that each [has] done and are doing, and the commitment that each group has shown.”

Calzavera says that part of the reason COC has fully engaged with the Site 41 issue "is actually that relationship between First Nations and the local agricultural community.” He emphasizes that “we often support fights like this, but this is a particularly important one because of the quality of the water—it is the purest groundwater that has ever been tested.

"The fight over Dump Site 41 is a metaphor for, and a link to, all the other fights to protect source waters and water sources in Ontario and across the country. They’re all under threat from bad development choices... and Site 41 is the one that is threatened the most right now.”

For more information about the Site 41 protests, including background information and resistance updates, go to www.stopdumpsite41.ca.

Alex Hundert is a community organiser and a founder of AW@L, Journalists for Human Rights - Laurier Waterloo Chapter, and the Earth Justice Initiative.

Dan Kellar is a PhD student at the University of Waterloo, undertaking research in the failure of environmental laws and policies in actually protecting the environment, and an organiser with AW@L

Site 41 Rainbow

Site 41 Sign

Tar Sands and Tankers

Van Ferrier — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 00:16:03 +0000

Enbridge Inc., a Calgary-based pipeline company, wants to bring tar sands tankers to British Columbia's coast. This opening segment will introduce you to the abundance of British Columbia's north coast, which includes the coastal waters of the Great Bear Rainforest.

Tar Sands & Water

Van Ferrier — Wed, 22 Apr 2009 00:04:58 +0000

Interviews with mostly members of the Fort MacKay and Fort Chipewyan communities, discussing cultural and environmental impacts of living downstream of the tar sands