The first part of the survey was asking about people’s resilience – where is it at, what supports it, what would they like more of.

The rationale for this was that my hypothesis was that, as people become increasingly challenged to meet their own survival needs, and their resilience wanes, they won’t have the capacity to deal with some of the harder and discomfiting stuff, like addressing racism or taking action to support reconciliation. Interestingly, I found that so many of the resilience responses pointed to the fact that we are all in this together… none of us are immune from climate stress, economic stress, or mental health stressors. Our individual health is tied to the health of the land, and each other. And we gain so much support from being part of a community, feeling belonging, and finding a sense of kinship and connection… even as we’re being challenged by what Life is throwing at is.

We asked people what the community organisations that they feel a sense of connection from, are doing with respect to truth and reconciliation, that you’d like to lift up/acknowledge or call out/suggest needs work?

I’ve organized these responses into themes.

Shout-outs to the Chamber, the Library, Signal Hill Elementary, Pemberton Secondary School, Village Yoga, PORCA, Stewardship Pemberton, Community Forest and Indigenous Women Outdoors:

• The Chamber’s commitment to indigenous members for free, and organizing a Canada Day parade that invited us to really step into thinking about how we weave ourselves together.
• The Chamber is constantly helping businesses make connections with Lil’wat community members and elevating their stories.
• Work training and access to courses.
• The Library’s programming, including Heather Joseph, Tanina Williams weaving.
• The library truly aspires to be of service to every person in the region – settler and Indigenous.
• Namwayut book club was powerful
• The school’s Pit Cook experience was amazing.
• Signal Hill Elementary is constantly striving to do good work in reconciliation.
• SHE and PSS are also doing a great job with courses and events and daily practices.
• With respect to Signal Hill and PSS, the staff is focused on embedding indigenous ways of knowing and doing into the classrooms and school communities. I love that we have so many incredible indigenous staff working in both schools who are explicitly sharing indigenous language and culture with all staff and students. . As a collective group we are showing that “every culture and people are the same. No one is less or more than. Everyone has great intelligence and creativity.” (Tanina Williams) Currently, Tanina and I are planning an inquiry project that asks how the incorporation of indigenous weaving techniques into mathematics education, through hands-on learning experiences, foster a culturally responsive and holistic environment, promoting both mathematical understanding and the preservation of traditional knowledge among students. I’m so excited to be working with her. She is brilliant on so many levels and being in her presence feeds my soul.
• Raelene and Village Yoga promote a spirit of healing and reconciliation.
• I believe through Village yoga I am learning in community to learn so I am able to share
• PORCA programs and intention is admirable.
• PORCA – Inclusion and encouragement for Indigenous participants
• PORCA is a great example of a community organization actively working on reconciliation.
• Trails organizations seem to be having conversations about access, traditional cultural uses, and names.. Can we consider traditional place names for Pemberton spaces?
• I have seen PVTA is working closely with the Nations on the trails, signage etc.
• The work that is being done by the Trails Master Plan Working group committee, PORCA has committed to reconciliation for this group to work on and has been the driving force behind it
• Acknowledgement, working with Lilwat Nation on events and trails.
• Porca and pvta partnerships with the nations
• I know that PORCA has chosen to lead through engagement with local nations and informing members that they are recreating on unceded territory.
• Love seeing the good work of Indigenous women outdoors
• Stewardship Pemberton has it’s first Lilwat Nation member on their board and has been working with elders on the watershed model acknowledgement of Lilwat presence now and historically.
• I am very accepted at stewardship Pemberton with the board. And Im getting more comfortable with the hand drum songs
• Andrea with the Community Forest has been a really engaging go between for conversations about land use.

Other positive initiatives:

• Greater reach within the community
• Normalizing the use of Ucwalmicwts
• Events that allow people to learn skills and listen to community members and elders eg circle work, weaving.
• Continued cooperative efforts from the community
• They actively seek to learn more and share it.

There’s still so far to go:

• Seems as if T &R is socially stuck at present
• not much
• its hard to clarify an answer, I think all of us could do more.
• pemberton is unfriendly to first nations people
• There is very little amount of acknowledgement but much reference to truth and reconciliation.
• There’s way too much tension between a large Native band and old-time Pemberton residents. And now to add to this is food insecurity. And the judgements of poverty.
• true reconciliation looks like changing of mindset and taking a step back with giving the decision-making authority to Nations.
• Delete the Pemberton forum page
• I don’t personally know of the work they are doing towards truth and reconcilliation
• I don’t really know. There is not a lot that I do in Pemberton.
• I feel relatively uninformed about most of these organizations’ approach to truth and reconciliation.

A few other comments:

“I am not sure if by saying lift up – I am indicating that they need to do better. I do think that the library does a great job with creating an inclusive space, as does Village Yoga and SPS. They are actively working towards truth telling. If lift up means do better – I think PVTA (and PORCA) really need to be careful about building trails on unceded lands. There is a lot of disrespectful trail building taking place that really bothers me (for example, above/next to Cookie Cutter. At the base of Tszil, amongst culturally modified trees). I know it may not be them doing the building, but they need to take a more solid stance on this and inform people if they don’t understand the negative impacts this is having.”

“It would be great for more of the athletic organizations to be working directly with Lil Wat Nation to integrate children into more sports programs so that there are not isolations from the reservation. I would also love to see Lil’Wat Capital assets host meetings for non members to understand how they are influencing development in Pemberton and what their protocol agreement between the village and their nation means to their community.”

“I was part of the Mountain Muse Festival in the Barn and was so happy to be there together with many artists from Lil’wat nation. I appreciated how pemberton arts council actively encouraged involvement from Lil’wat artists and waived the vendor fee which I believe was a respectful way of acknowledging whose land on which the event was held. This was a great event not only for art but for the community building amongst us that resulted.”

“I’m unsure. It still seems very disconnected. I don’t know what they acknowledge in the Pemberton organizations (I just moved back). I still think the Pemberton Community is lacking in their knowledge and curiosity in the Lil’wat culture. I know individuals that care, but not the whole community in full support of Lil’wat and vice versa. The two communities still feel stuck in the same spot as when I was growing up here +20 years ago.”

“See to a potential establishment of a group similar to the Wellness Almanac or aid for continuing of the Wellness Almanac.”