The Sinixt Confederacy will celebrate the opening of its new office in Nelson next week, further reestablishing their presence in the West Kootenay in the wake of a landmark court decision.
The office opened on Aug. 1 in the Gray Building on Vernon Street but a grand opening and blessing is planned Wednesday, Oct. 25 starting outside the building at 11 a.m. There will be presentations at the Nelson Museum from 11:30 to 12:10 followed by refreshments.
Jarred-Michael Erickson, the chair of the Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation, to whom the Sinixt belong, called the office opening “an important step in the implementation” of the Supreme Court of Canada’s ruling in the Desautel case and in the “process of reclaiming our responsibility to protect and sustainably manage our traditional territory in Canada for current and future generations.”
The court recognized the Sinixt are an “aboriginal peoples” of Canada despite being declared extinct by the federal government in 1956 and have a constitutionally-protected right to hunt in their traditional territory in BC.
A celebration of the decision was held in Nelson’s Lakeside Park in 2022.
Most Sinixt now live in Washington state, although successive court rulings found their move to the southernmost part of their territory was not by choice.