A river runs through it

Page 3

When storm clouds gather over Tsawataineuk, you don't just put on your raincoat. You get yourself home, and fast.

Once or twice a year, after a good rain, this First Nations village on the British Columbia coast is flooded from one end to the other by two-and-a-half to three feet of water. Every home and building in Tsawataineuk sits on top of stilts.

"If it rains steady all day, the river would be coming up into the village by the evening," said Chief Willie Moon. "Sometimes it can be a matter of a few hours."

But even the stilts haven't stopped more than 20 community members from drowning in the turbulent waters of the Kingcome River in the past 50 years.

It didn't use to be this way. There would be an occasional mild flood when the river burst out of its banks, but nothing like this. Then came the loggers.

Starting 100 years ago, clear-cutting left the valley upriver devoid of trees. This, in turn, meant rainwater didn't get absorbed as much into the soil and instead gorged the river, making it dangerous to the community.

The river is still the only way to get people, fuel and supplies in and out of the isolated community of 150 people, which isn't connected to any roads and has no airport.

Ten years ago, Tsawataineuk told the federal government it needed an access road to connect it to the coast seven kilometres down-river, so the community could have a safer alternative to the wild river. The government agreed to fund the road, but there was a hitch. The land between the community and the ocean was owned by private landowners.

All the landowners agreed to let the community build the road, except for one - an environmental group called Nature Trust.

"[The road] would have serious impacts on the fish and wildlife in the estuary," said Ron Erickson, the Vancouver-based group's executive vice-president.

Nature Trust owns 1,060 acres along the river, one of many chunks of land it has purchased around the province - partly using government funds - to preserve for conservation purposes. Erickson's advice to Tsawataineuk: move the village.

"They were quite upset when we suggested that because their ancestors have lived there for generations," he said.

The B.C. government, which manages the land on behalf of Nature Trust, is also refusing to grant a right-of-way for the road, which means Tsawataineuk is out of luck, even though it has never signed away any of its land in the area in a treaty or land agreement.

Erickson acknowledged that the river has become a menace, and said his group has offered to sell the land to Tsawataineuk. Its price: $1 million.

Ardith Walkem, the community's lawyer, said Tsawataineuk just doesn't have that kind of money.

"They couldn't afford it even if it was $100,000."

So the community is going to court. It is putting the final touches on a lawsuit it plans to file in British Columbia Supreme Court which will seek a declaration that the current access to the community isn't safe, and that reserve lands have a right of safe access. The court will be asked to order the defendants - Canada and British Columbia - to provide safe access.

But the clock is ticking. The construction season ends in August, so if work on the road isn't done by then Tsawataineuk will have to test its luck for another year on the Kingcome River.