A Wet'suwet’en Chief is not necessarily born into the role but begins preparing for their role at a young age.  

The Wet'suwet’en Nation is made up of 13 houses, each house has a house Chief and secondary leaders called wing chiefs. Chiefs are chosen based on their merit by the father clans, differing from European or British hereditary systems.

A chief is responsible for the traditional hereditary territories' land and resources for the community and the welfare and health of the people. The hereditary chiefs and leaders have jurisdiction and authority over their unceded territories.

Our governance system was considered inferior only because our ways of life, our beliefs, and our governance structures were different than Canadian governance systems.

The reserve Chief and Band Council were created as a result of the Indian Act of 1876, which was established and written by the European government, not by any Aboriginal person.

It was formed as a means to impose a foreign governance system and leadership structure on the Aboriginal Hereditary Chiefs.   

The Chiefs and Band Councils are just the administrative bodies for Aboriginal peoples who are living in reserve communities.

They are put there by the Canadian government. They have no jurisdiction over the Aboriginal traditional territories. 

I’m just setting the facts straight for all the Aboriginal Hereditary Chiefs in Canada.   

These elected Chiefs and Councils have no authorization on traditional hereditary territories. They are there to administer the welfare and health of the people living in reserve communities in Canada for the Canadian government system.

The Wet'suwet’en unceded territories refer to the hereditary traditional lands of the Wet’suwet’en Nation, in British Columbia, Canada, which we have never sold, surrendered, or relinquished to the Crown or the government of Canada.

The term "unceded" emphasizes the ongoing assertion of Wet'suwet’en sovereignty and land rights, a core aspect of the Nation's resistance against all industry projects that traverse our ancestors' territories that the Wet'suwet’en Nation and the people have historically occupied and managed since time immemorial and have never legally transferred title or rights to the Crown or to the Government of Canada.

By referring to it as “unceded" the Wetsu’wet’en Nation is asserting its ongoing sovereignty and inherent right to self-determination and jurisdiction over its traditional hereditary lands, which are protected under the Canadian Constitution and international declarations, such as the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

Kwat’bid’jah (Kneekap H. Nikal)

Kwat’bid’jah is an Elder of the Wet'suwet’en Nation, a wing chief of the Owl House of the Lik’samis’yu (Killer Whale & Fireweed) Clan, age 72.

A list of all the benefits of proportional representation would reassure him that PR is indeed a much better system than our present first-past-the-post system.

Just one item on that list, a 50 per cent chance that when you place your ballot into the ballot box, you're wasting your vote. It will either go to a candidate who didn't get elected or to a candidate who already had enough votes to get elected and didn't need yours. Yours would be excess.

Wasted, excess, because, unlike in a first-past-the-post system, in a proportional system, every ballot would go toward electing a candidate from the party of your choice.

The end result would be that the percentage of seats a party won would equal the percentage of the popular vote that party got. In PR countries such as the Scandinavian countries, around 95 per cent of ballots cast go towards electing someone. In Canada, only around 50 per cent do.

When you cast your ballot, would you opt for a 50 per cent chance you would be making a difference, or would you opt for the 95 per cent chance?

Darryl Sturdy

Vancouver

While my son and I were enjoying a rare camping trip at Chilliwack Provincial Park, you noticed my truck was unlocked and stole my son’s keys and my insurance (including transfer papers). With my address and the keys to my home, you came and took my jewelry box and my most recent bank statements. 

When we realized what happened the next morning, my son and I were instantly worried about our beloved pet cat, who is terrified of anyone other than us. We were also worried that the doors were left open and she would be gone, running from the source of her terror into the night and not found again. It was a tense one hour as we travelled back to our home.

We are grateful you left the doors closed after your burglary. My cat was still hiding in the two-inch space under the treadmill when we got home. She is traumatized but will recover.

We are also grateful you didn’t take my son’s car, as you had the keys, unlocked the garage door and obviously looked around. However, selling a stolen car is much more risky than selling 60 years’ worth of inexpensive jewellery.  Although the jewelry you stole has little monetary value, it had a lot of emotional value to me. I had pieces given to me from my deceased mother, from my friends, and other items that had emotional content for me. 

I don’t know if you will come back to collect other items that you liked but weren’t as portable. The police said it was possible, and have advised me to keep my phone at hand at all times.  Although I changed my locks and now have the doors locked at all times, my sense of security is gone. 

You also stole my belief that I could go to a provincial park and have a safe and enjoyable time, as I have for the past 40 years. I now know that I need to lock up everything I own, even during the day. I was told mine was the third unlocked vehicle that had been burglarized in a week.

To anyone else who loves the outdoors and enjoys taking advantage of our fabulous and well-kept provincial parks: Make sure you are safe. Ensure every one of your valuables is secured at all times. The provincial park staff are amazing, but they are not security guards and cannot ensure your belongings are safe. The crime against me was a crime of opportunity, and I provided the opportunity by not locking my truck during the day. 

I hope everyone else has a lovely and safe time at all our local parks, keeping belongings secured against opportunists who want to take our belongings and our sense of safety.

Karen Berry

We have been married for over 70 years and my wife Gladys started to forget things about a year and a half ago and I thought it was old age.

As time went on she would forget how to use the washer and dryer, TV, remote, phone. She started asking to go home and would pack a bag and I would say 'honey you are home and this house and all are yours.' 

This would happen 10 times a day then she would get up at night, dress and go out for a walk while I was sleeping. As it happened a few times I called 811, told them the story and they called an ambulance and my wife was admitted to Chilliwack Hospital for assessment.

The doctors, nurses and staff at CGH were so professional and caring, it was wonderful. Our life up until now had been great, going south in the winter and golfing and going to the Chilliwack casino to play bingo, putting in a few coins and having a great lunch at the restaurant.

But then my wife would miss numbers and sometime bingos. We stopped going to bingo altogether and I now think that was a bad move because it would have been easier to look after her there than being the caregiver at home. 

The hospital recommended she be put in a home, so I applied and was she was taken to Heritage Village in the Alzheimer's area. The staff and everyone in that should get a medal for there wonderful caring.   

My daughters Jennifer and Micheline have been a pillar of strength and help (I thank them). We try to visit Gladys daily if we can, and I write this letter as most of the patients get no visitors. I want to tell a short story on this, as with my wife every day or even mornings is a new day. So you can start to think all memory is lost!

The other week I asked my wife if she would like to go for a walk in the beautiful gardens of Heritage. As we walked in the gardens my wife would stop and smell the new flowers and would tell me their names, then she would pull a branch from a tree smell the leaves and say the type of tree it was. At the end of the garden I got two chairs and we sat watching the traffic on Knight Road and I asked if she remembered it and she said never seen it (we live facing Knight Road). Then I asked if she remembered the old bingo hall which she loved to go to and said never been there.

As we sat holding hands she started to cry and I said 'honey, don’t be sad,' and she put her head on my shoulder and said 'I am not crying because I’m sad. I am crying because you are here and I love you!' (I was lost for words).

I have found that some times a nerve is stuck and a bit of memory comes back.                                                            

Lest We Forget.                                                                          

Jim Davies  

Chilliwack

The auxiliary has over 68 members and this year they volunteered over 28,022 hours. The Bulkley Lodge, BVD Hospital and the community received donations over $263,097 in 2024.

At our last meeting, we pledged $262,290.09 for the hospital and lodge for 2025.

We thank the community for donating and supporting our New to You Store. Our store is a community effort with lots of volunteering!

Winette McEwen

President, B.V.D.Hospital Auxiliary Society

He might feel bewildered that his new King actually resides in a far distant country, but that will only make him even more Canadian. He may need to get used to that prevailing Canadian oxymoron — that we are a nation of extreme moderation, but he’ll adjust!

Think of it — Canada extending from the far reaches of the Arctic to the southern edges of the continent and the Gulf of Canada! This union can’t help but make Canada Great Again!

So, what do you think, Donald? A looney for your thoughts?

Donald?

Hmmm — short attention span.

Ron Kilby

Smithers

It’s mid-May 2025, and while the province is not yet under siege from forest fires, and the backcountry remains open, the writing is on the wall, or rather, in the sky. The snowpack vanished early, the ground is dry, and the forecasts are anything but comforting. Everyone from climatologists to firefighters are warning us, this summer could rival the worst we’ve ever seen.

Which is why I ask: why wait? Just imagine what Chilliwack would be like if the Chilliwack River Valley, Cultus Lake, the Columbia Valley, the Eastern Hillsides, or even Harrison Hot Springs, or any other location near us were to be consumed by forest fire. It's unimaginable. Yet we are at far greater risk in this area with the larger population density that will descend upon our backcountry from now until the cooler weather in the fall. With the large increase in homeless camps in our local forests, the risks are even higher. 

We’ve been here before. 2017, 2018, 2023 – entire communities upended or erased. People displaced. Lives lost. Recovery that takes years, if it ever comes. And every time, we hear the same post-mortem: “We should’ve acted sooner.”

This year, let’s actually do that.

Close the backcountry preemptively, and remove the homeless camps before disaster hits. It won't be easy, or fair to some, but everyone is a risk. 

I say this as someone who values Crown land access deeply. I hike, I camp, I fish, I hunt, I photograph. These wild spaces are sacred to many of us. But keeping them open during extreme wildfire risk is not freedom, it’s foolishness. And the price of that gamble is paid by small towns, Indigenous communities, rural residents, and everywhere that forest fire smoke invades with its toxic particulates.

Yes, many of us in B.C. have behaved responsibly. Yet, human caused fires have caused on average, 39 per cent of them in recent years. It only takes one discarded cigarette, fireworks, or a tailpipe over dry grass to light the fuse.

Let’s not rely on luck this year. Let’s rely on leadership.

The B.C. government must establish a clear, enforceable policy for closing high-risk backcountry areas when wildfire risk reaches critical levels, before the flames do. This shouldn’t be a reactive panic measure, instead it should be a well-communicated, repeatable part of fire season response. Much like avalanche forecasts guide winter backcountry access, fire risk should guide summer closures.

And while tourism will undoubtedly take a temporary hit, the alternative is long-term economic ruin for regions scorched and shuttered by fire. The short-term losses are nothing compared to the devastation of a fire like Elephant Hill, Lytton, or White Rock Lake.

It’s time we stopped treating the fire season like an exception. It’s now the rule.

So to Premier David Eby and the Government of British Columbia: Close the backcountry before it burns.

To my fellow British Columbians: if you truly love your backcountry escapes, prove it by staying out when the danger is high. No fires. No fireworks. No risk. If you see someone being reckless, report it, and record it.

Let’s be smart this year. Not selfish. Not reactive. Not sorry.

To the wildfire crews preparing for another exhausting summer: thank you. We see you. We support you.

Let’s give them fewer fires to fight.

Sincerely,

Carsten Arnold
Chilliwack

Its goal is to create environments that are safe, trustworthy, and empowering—spaces that promote healing and resilience while preventing further harm. I believe many of us long for this kind of compassionate, informed approach in our communities and within ourselves.

Over the past five years, however, I’ve sadly witnessed a rise in entitlement, greed, and self-righteous attitudes rooted in self-interest. When the freedom to question authority or express differing opinions is met with dismissive, irrelevant, and sometimes even insulting labels, especially by our politicians, and the public response is silence, it deeply troubles me.

For decades, governments of all parties have contributed to division among us. Political strategies often involve favouring certain groups for votes while fostering confusion, mistrust and misunderstandings between citizens. If we, the people, actually took the time to connect—beyond political lines—we’d likely discover we have far more in common than not.

Unfortunately, many important conversations today are avoided out of fear of being attacked or judged.

The recent Blue Hat Memorial display in Campbell River highlighted the 50,000 deaths caused by the opioid crisis throughout Canada. Last fall’s display for B.C. alone was for 15,000 deaths, and within the total for men, 70 per cent of deaths were industry/blue-collar workers.

Each flag represents a person—a life lost, a family grieving.

We must ask not only how they died, but why so many feel such deep pain in the first place. When we reflect on the roots of trauma, we often look back to childhood. I often wonder how many were shaped or hurt by early experiences within the school system. How many felt seen or valued in their brilliance and uniqueness? In my generation, I remember in high school, trades were said to be for the "stupid" kids. 

Bullying comes in many forms. I offer these reflections with humility, knowing that each of us has a different story or contemplation.

I am genuinely concerned for the future of our politics, as more freedoms are stripped away and entitlement and greed grow among our so-called leaders. We, the people, must hold our politicians, ministries, corporations, organizations and ourselves to standards of honour, humility, and accountability. Ultimately, we are all responsible for the state of our country and the direction it’s heading.

“To whom much is given, much is required” is a phrase I was taught early in life—by my grandparents, my family, and my faith. It’s a reminder that those with privilege, opportunity, and knowledge carry a responsibility to serve and uplift others. I do not take my blessings here in Canada for granted. That is why I’m writing this letter.

May we all find within ourselves more love, more compassion, and a deeper desire to truly understand one another and discover the beauty within us all.

Sincerely,

Lisa Perry

Smithers

I was born in Smithers in 1972 and lived there for the better part of my life. It saddened me to read an opinion piece about the need for the noon siren to go the way of the dodo ("The Sticky Files: The noon siren has outlived its usefulness," The Interior News, Feb. 27, 2025).

Canada as a whole has been under attack of late by those who would say that this nation and its people have no culture. It has been said that we are now a "post-national state" (whatever that means).

We have had to endure the erasing of our history and the tearing down of our forefathers' statues. And now, in my little hometown; get rid of the noon siren.

I think we must understand, respect and embrace our culture and our shared history and even our local quirks. Instead of seeing them as outdated and unnecessary, let us see them as part of the fabric that makes us united.

Peace be with you

Tyler Fox
Bluesky, Alta.

But as the mayor of Smithers, and as a councillor for the municipality, he never hesitated to help a young reporter living in the Bulkley Valley in the 1980s.

His comments and quotes were always clear and to the point.

Best of all, he never let a reporter forget how to spell his first name.

"It's Carman with a m-a-n at the end. As in 'man'."

Rod Link

Terrace, B.C.