By Sarah Stone

SaskPower and Sandy Bay try to heal old tensions

Apr 28, 2013 | 8:18 AM

A century-old conflict between the northern community of Sandy Bay and SaskPower could be moving towards a resolution.

SaskPower recently commissioned a report to develop a strategy to rebuild the strained relationship that dates back to when the Island Falls hydroelectric dam was being built.

Construction of various dams along the Churchill River started in the late 1920s to provide power to Manitoba mining operations. During this time, sturgeon populations, shoreline habitats and the community water supply underwent major changes. At no point were First Nations people in the area involved in the decision making behind these projects.

“Some of our community members still have anger because we had nothing at all from SaskPower since the day they started building,” said Sandy Bay Mayor Daniel Bear.

Bear did add there have been small contributions to the community over the years, but nothing to make an impact.

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Events in the following decades continued to widen the disconnect between First Nations residents of Sandy Bay and SaskPower, which still exists today, explained Bear. He said other dams have been built in the area caused flooding which damaged the lands and homes along the river—even resulting in a drowning.

However, Robert Watson with SaskPower said the company wants to stop looking at the past and see what can be done for the future.

“[SaskPower] is a major employer up in that area that we [want] to do everything we possibly can to further the communities development and we thought the best way to do that was to have an independent consultant come in and do a complete study interaction with the Sandy Bay people,” he said, adding it gives the community their own voice.

Watson recognizes there have been historic frustrations, but insisted the current relationship has no tensions.

He explained the community wants to be engaged with the developments going up, and so SaskPower wants to ensure this happens in not just Sandy Bay, but numerous northern areas.

“We have a new, renewed long-term plan to make First Nations an integral part of our developments in the North,” he said, which means First Nations can work “in corporation” with the company.

Although no formal decisions have been made on where and how SaskPower will contribute, the study written by Dialogue For Partners suggests a building a new arena and senior’s home, as well as investing in education and training programs.

“If they can help us in infrastructure like this, I’m happy. It’s exactly what we want in our community. We need to see something here, we can’t do it ourselves you know. We need the arena, homes for the elders—those are things we need in our community,” Bear said.

According to the mayor, he is thankful a third party came in to listen and find the needs of the community because it would be too conflicted if Sandy Bay residents tried to do it themselves.

In June, SaskPower plans to take up the next stage of the process and sit down with the community to go through a check list of what can be accomplished and what needs to be worked on in the future.

sstone@panow.com

On Twitter: @sarahstone84

With files from Sean Leslie.