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THURSDAY, APRIL 21, 2016 • MERRITT NEWSPAPERS
Movie with deep message being filmed near Merritt Michael Potestio THE MERRITT HERALD
The second annual march to end Violence Against Women in Relationships (VAWIR) attracted a crowd of about 45 last Thursday in downtown Merritt. One of the special guest speakers was Margaret Wormell, who was an instrumental player in forming VAWIR’s committee in Merritt. Michael Potestia/Herald
Education and awareness the key to eliminating violence against women Second annual event in Merritt attracts crowd of 45 supporters last week Michael Potestio THE MERRITT HERALD
The woman who was instrumental in forming a violence against women committee in Merritt returned home last week spreading the message that local citizens can lead the fight against domestic abuse. Merritt’s second annual march to end Violence Against Women in Relationships (VAWIR) saw many familiar faces in town. One of those was guest speaker
Margaret Wormell, who lived in Merritt for decades and worked as a therapist at Nicola Family Therapy before moving four years ago to Iqualit, where she now works as a child protection worker. Wormell was also an instrumental player in forming Merritt’s VAWIR committee. Speaking to a crowd of about 45 people on Thursday (April 14) at Spirit Square before a police escorted march around the downtown, Wormell said people can be agents of change by being
involved in the work to end violence against women. Wormell said she thinks there’s more education, awareness and supports in place exposing violence against women than in the past. Chelsea Morrey, Interior Community Services program director and VAWIR committee member, said that while most victims of domestic violence are women, a
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Husband and wife filmmaking team Petie Chalifoux and Micheal Auger are hoping for a watershed moment when Canadian audiences see their first fulllength feature film. The dynamic duo are currently shooting a feature length movie on location at the Nooaitch Reserve with the intention of shedding light on the issue of missing and murdered indigenous women in Canada. Nooaitch Reserve is located 20 kilometres west of Merritt. “I hope it will be a transformational or a watershed-type of experience for the people who see this to feel the pain that a family goes through,” said Auger, who is directing the film. “It doesn’t matter what your language or colour or background is — family is family.” The movie is titled River of Silence, and it tells the story of
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a woman living in present-day Vancouver who experiences every parent’s horror when she hears her daughter went missing while travelling to visit extended family on a remote First Nations reserve. Chalifoux wrote the screenplay, which touches on an issue she knows all too well. In 2000, her grandmother went missing in northern Alberta and was later found dead under suspicious circumstances, with no answers regarding her death to date. “There was a whole bunch of things that didn’t fit for me or my family and so to this day we still believe that she was murdered, but the police say it was a mysterious death,” Chalifoux said. “Our energy now is … let’s open this up as much as possible and find a way to change people’s minds about a lot of things around just violence in general,”
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