‘The Spanish … is our territory'
Lack of consultation with Sagamok-Anishnawbek FN
on Spanish River irks band councillor

By Craig Gilbert

It was mid-afternoon, a few minutes in to the last presentation of the day.
The 50 or so delegates at the day-long Spanish Harbour/River Area of Concern Remedial Action Plan Update Seminar were in the home stretch, taking in some relatively tame data on fishery assessments performed by Sagamok Anishnawbek in recent years.

Then the presenter, Bruce McGregor, gave the floor to Sagamok-Anishnawbek First Nation band councillor, Ray McGregor. Speaking about experiences with the river as far back as 60 years ago, McGregor said he had been listening all day to government scientists saying the river is getting better, and just needs some time to become its pre-industrial self.

From the back of the room, he rose and respectfully disagreed.
“Sagamok remains concerned about the quality of water and the fish in the Spanish River,” he said. “Despite the government saying it is on the road to recovery, the river no longer supports a food fishery for Sagamok.”
McGregor said there were no First Nations included in the discussion about the river or efforts to fix the river, despite what he described as an extensive list of partners involved in the movement, including the Friends of the Spanish River, federal and provincial ministries and heaps of other organizations, some of them private companies, many of them volunteer-based. He also took issue with the fact that there were only four people at the seminar representing municipal governments, and that just one of them had any voting power, Sables-Spanish Rivers councillor Charlie Smith.
“The Spanish River watershed is our territory,” he said. “If something happens, we have to know about it. You have to come to Sagamok so we can do our own environmental assessment. That's according to the Supreme Court of Canada. It's the first thing, and the last thing.”
McGregor recalled a spring day in the late 1940s. He was out at the river with his grandfather to check trap lines for muskrat. At the time, trapping the critters provided many if not all of the families in the area with a living. When they got to the water, it was churning with dead or dying fish.
“My grandfather knew something was wrong, but he couldn't figure it out,” McGregor said. “We were told not to touch the fish, and after that day, I didn't think anymore of it. After that summer, we were told not to swim in the river, not to drink the water, not to eat the fish. ‘Stay away from the river,' they said.
“No one told us what caused it, but the river went downhill from there. Within three years, it was a waste of time to look for muskrat.”
McGregor said families went from getting 300 muskrat a year to none. Wild rice, once a staple for Sagamok residents, also disappeared.
“This all impacted how we live,” he said. “We couldn't depend on the river anymore.”
Soon after that he left for residential school. He didn't return until the early 1980s.
“Then in 1983, it happened again,” he said, referring to the well-documented spill from the Espanola mill of that year. “Every time there is a flood, those lagoons go out and we end up with a bunch of dead fish.
“Everything flows into that river, it's our lifeline to the rest of the world, but I don't see anyone helping to actually change things, to help the river. You are concerned with what the government will let you get away with, not the environment. After 60 years, I still see no change.”