I just read the letter to the editor from Chuck Stielstra, complaining about the proposal for full restoration of the Eklutna River. Let us unpack this a little bit.
I remember the fish camps on Point Woronzof, and the remains of fish camps on Ship Creek across from Emard’s cannery. It wasn’t that long ago that this was the Indigenous people’s way of life.
This was taken from them by settler colonialism.
Nobody consulted with them about damming the Eklutna River and mining the riverbed for gravel with no compensation to the Eklutna villagers and letting white people homestead around the village when villagers had no property rights. Now it seems that there was a backroom deal fostered by a previous mayor and a couple of utilities to shortchange the Eklutna people again.
— Jay Cross
Big Lake
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