Treaty 8 Statement on Site C

Nun wa dee Stewardship Society 9824 98A Avenue Fort St. John British Columbia V1J 1S2 Office (250) 785-8508 Fax (250) 785-8507

June 7, 2017 Our file: 6502 Sent via email Original will not follow in the mail The Honourable Christy Clark Premier, Province of British Columbia West Annex, Parliament Buildings Victoria, British Columbia, V8V 1X4 Jessica McDonald Chief Executive Officer British Columbia Hydro Power and Authority 333 Dunsmuir St., Vancouver, British Columbia, V6B 5R3 Jessica.McDonald@bchydro.com Premier Clark and Ms. McDonald, Je aa haanach’e: RE:

Site C Project's Cache Creek Highway 29 Realignment Unlawful and Risks Wildly Overstated

As you know, we are the chiefs of Prophet River First Nation and West Moberly First Nations. We write to correct the public record regarding claims you have made in response to the Honourable John Horgan’s request to postpone construction of the Highway 29 Realignment at Cache Creek as part of the Site C Project.

BC Hydro’s Cache Creek Realignment Violates Environmental Assessment Approvals, likely to be Suspended In recent days, you have both made headlines by announcing BC Hydro’s intention to push ahead with the realignment of Highway 29 at Cache Creek, letting contracts by June 15th and forcing local farmers from their homes by the end of the month. But what has not been reported is that a Dunne-za gravesite identified in June 2016 is also located on the centerline of the proposed highway realignment. The new highway would also destroy a nearby sweat lodge and other important cultural sites in the area that has and continues to be used by the Dunne-za (Beaver People) for thousands of years.

On March 22 and 23, 2017, we met with Government and BC Hydro staff to discuss the Cache Creek Realignment. We shared a March 1, 2015 archeological report confirming that the gravesite identified at Cache Creek should be considered a human burial site of the Dunne-za. This report has not been challenged by your archaeologists. We also presented a March 15, 2017 engineering and geological report confirming that an alternate highway realignment exists which would avoid the gravesite, sweat lodge,

and expropriations of local farmers. In fact, BC Hydro’s own Environmental Impact Statement confirms that this alternative is technically and economically feasible. It has an incremental cost of about $5 million, or 0.06% of Site C’s $9 billion budget.

On March 29, 2017, we received a letter denying our request to avoid the destruction of these cultural sites.

Avoidance of impacts to these sites is not only possible, it is required by the legally-binding conditions to BC Hydro’s environmental assessment approvals. So, we submitted formal complaints to the Environmental Assessment Office (“EAO”) and the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency (“CEAA”) in May 2017 for non-compliance with these conditions, asking that work at Cache Creek be suspended until BC Hydro establishes plans to adopt an alternative route. We are asking EAO and CEAA to provide responses to these complaints prior to June 15, 2017, and have every reason to expect work to be suspended imminently. If it does not occur, we will consider ever option available to us to ensure respect for our sacred laws and the federal and provincial approvals governing the project.

There is no Threat of a One-Year Delay At the meeting on March 22-23, 2017, BC Hydro explained why it would prefer to have the new highway at Cache Creek built before river diversion in September 2019: if heavy rains occurred after river diversion, the existing highway might flood, which might result in temporary closures of that section of the highway.

But one must suspend logic to jump from this potential risk, to the decision to delay river diversion by a full year, particularly if the costs are between $600 and $600 million, as you have recently claimed.

Here’s why: 1. The Realignment at Cache Creek can, in fact, be completed by September 2019. If geotechnical work, consultations with First Nations and landowners begin this summer, initial design, and permitting begin this summer, BC Hydro would have the spring of 2018 to finalize design, with construction to be completed between the summers of 2018 and fall of 2019. This would be roughly 18 months to complete less than nine kilometers of new road. Moreover, by adopting the alternative route, BC Hydro would avoid unnecessary desecration of Cache Creek gravesite, sweat lodge, and expropriations of farming families.

2. Even if the Cache Creek Realignment was not completed before September 2019, there is no need for a one-year delay. First, it is extremely unlikely that any natural flood event could result in the closure of the existing highway. At the meeting on March 22-23, 2017, BC Hydro’s engineers confirmed that it was the risk of a 1-in-200-year flood event that they wished to avoid. Second, the cost of addressing a flood event of this nature would be a fraction of the cost of delaying river diversion until the following year, again assuming the $600 million to $630 million estimates you have cited publicly are accurate. We suspect the Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure or BC Hydro have assessed costs of mitigating impacts through standard practices (e.g. public notices, road closures, maintenance and repair, etc), but have not received any response to our requests to review this data or to work with your staff to address any risks, no matter how unlikely they may be.

Summary Your plans to desecrate a Dunne-za grave, destroy a nearby sacred sweat lodge, and evict farmers by pushing ahead with your current plans for the Cache Creek Realignment are unlawful, unnecessary, and

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unjustified. You can and should pursue an alternative highway realignment which avoids these sites and which your own studies confirm are technically and economically feasible. The financial risks described in your recent statements regarding work at Cache Creek are wildly overstated. No sensible project manager would consider delaying river diversion by a year at a cost of $630 million rather than budgeting a fraction of that amount as contingency funds to draw from in the event that 1-in-200 year event were to occur. In short, postponing the Cache Creek Realignment presents no risk of a one-year delay to the project, and price tag you’ve placed on Mr. Horgan’s request is a little more than an opportunistic fabrication.

In the spirit and intent of Treaty No. 8, we will continue to engage with the Crown in good faith and expect to be meaningfully consulted and reasonably accommodated.

Wuujo aasana laa,

Chief Lynette Tsakoza Prophet River First Nation

C.C.

Chief Roland Willson West Moberly First Nations

John Horgan, Leader of the BC NDP Andrew Weaver, Leader of the BC Green Party

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