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  • Table of Contents

    • Part 1: First Nations of the Peace River Region
    • Part 2: The Fur Trade Era
    • Part 3: Transportation and Communication
    • Part 4: Old Timers and the Price of Land
    • Part 5: Dawson Creek: The Story of the Community
    • Part 6: Mysteries, Adventures and Indian Legends
    • Part 7: Arts, Crafts and Recreation
    • Part 8: Agriculture
    • Part 9: Church Histories
    • Part 10: Schools
    • Part 11: Health Care
    • Part 12: Industries and Enterprises
    • Part 13: Policing the Peace
    • Part 14: Pouce Coupe, Rolla, and Other South Peace Communities
    • Part 15: Chetwynd and the Fort St. John Area
    • Part 16: The Alberta Peace
    • Part 17: Natural History of the Peace River Region
    • Part 18: Interviews with Old Timers
    • Part 19: Remembering Our Veterans

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BN01-16: Kelly Lake First Nation at an Impasse

Recent History – 2001-2003

September 12, 2002

By Mark Nielsen, Daily News Staff

Members of Kelly Lake First Nation (KLFN) will be stepping up their action as part of a move to break free of the Saulteau First Nations.

KLFN spokesperson Corinne Shearer said Wednesday that talks between the two groups have reached an impasse. The Saulteau offered to negotiate an economic development agreement with the KLFN, but Shearer said that is not good enough.

“That’s not what we want,” she said. “We want them to respect our traditional territory and to recognize that we live up there.

“We said they are now treating us like we were just contractors with no traditional interest and no traditional rights and history. So I guess you could say now that the gloves are off now and the war is on.”

Since last Thursday, a blockade has been up alongside the Old Heritage Highway at the Rat Lake entrance to the Wapiti River, about a 90 minute drive south from Dawson Creek. Shearer said that blockade was symbolic and that the search is on for another location that will have a bigger impact on the Saulteau.

“We will probably be blockading elsewhere, not a main road to block the public, but a road where the First Nations need access to — an area where they work in our back yard,” she said.

She said that the KLFN wants to be recognized as a First Nation in its own right. Currently, it is not recognized by the federal and provincial governments, nor by the Oil and Gas Commission.

“We’ve never lived with the Saulteau band; we’ve always lived in Kelly Lake,” Shearer said. “So we’ve always been an independent band.”

About 160 people live in Kelly Lake of which 91 are of voting age, and of that total, 74 are members of the KLFN. They gained their status in 1994 after tracing their heritage back to the Beaver Indians north of the Peace River. However, they claim a presence in the Kelly Lake area dating back to the 1830s.

“We’ve just lived the Indian way. We just never had a number, but we all have our treaty cards now.”

The rest of the adult population in Kelly Lake consists of about a dozen Metis, a group that settled the area in about 1820, and a handful of Cree who belong to the Kelly Lake Cree Nations.

Shearer expects that the number of KLFN members will grow as their young people reach voting age.

“Our numbers will definitely go up because we all have kids,” Shearer said.

The Saulteau First Nations did not return phone calls Wednesday.

This article is taken from the Peace River Block Daily News, Dawson Creek, with the permission of the publisher. The Daily News retains all rights relating to this material. The information in this article is intended solely for research or general interest purposes.

« BN01-15: Kelly Lake First Nation Sets Up Blockade

BN01-17: Kelly Lake Settles with Saulteau »

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