Literacy Project Expanding By Leaps And Bounds

What started off as a small idea to provide a modular trailer to serve as a library for the Toosie band in Riske Creek has taken off like wildfire. The Lt. Governor’s Aboriginal Literacy Project is now expanding exponentially as the word gets out. One key figure on the project is ex-Rotary Governor Bob Blacker, who has been acting as the “point man” in much of the progress.

His Honour Steven Point and aid de camp Bob Blacker (left) have toured many First Nations communities

Travelling as an aid de camp with His Honour Stephen Point to many isolated communities around the province, Blacker has assisted in making key partnerships between Rotary clubs and various First Nations. Special to the Write to Read website, Blacker files the following report.

1. RIVERS INLET

Progress for the Rivers Inlet Project (Wuikinuxv or Oweekeno) has been exceptional. As a result of the two trips that we have had going into Oweekeno with Christoph Neufeld from Britco and our architect Scott Kemp has produced plans for the building, and a supplies list of required materials. The two trips have now enabled us to have Vancouver Coastal Health as a partner, as they have provided us with a means to apply for $25,000 to go towards the construction of the building.

The building itself has expanded exponentially as a result of meeting with the Oweekeno team and brainstorming what would work for the community. This meeting produced what we now call the Child of the Big House and it will 80′ x 110′, it will have a concrete pad 6″ thick reinforced with re-bar. As you can imagine the amount of cement we would require is daunting which caused us to look for a cement batch plant that would make the cement in a quarter of the time if we brought in small mixers. With that in mind the community and I went on a search to find such a plant, well as everything has gone with this project we have been able to find a supplier of such a machine and that company is willing to help us. This is huge as the cost would have been prohibitive to pay for this particular machine.

Schools and libraries, such as this one in Port Simpson, are integral to the growth of literacy

I am in the process of speaking with the company Surespan. Scott Kemp and I have spoken with the Richmond Firefighters and have left them with plans of the building. They are very anxious to get moving but because of the summer leave factor cannot start until September. Now that we have a batch plant for the foundations and cement pad the scheduling of the firefighters will be a lot easier and we feel we should have the pad done before the end of September and be well on the way in constructing the building.

Western Forrest Products and Interfor are donating the logs to the community. The community in turn will be milling the lumber as to the specs provided by Scott Kemp. Of interest we need two beams 110′ in length. The community and the two lumber companies are looking for those two trees as we speak and are very confident that we can find them. If we do the Creator again is working with us. This by far is the largest project we have ever done with the Government House/Rotary Literacy Project. Logistically it has been a huge challenge but we have managed to work our way through it.

2. HALALT / LYACKSON

This community is just south of Chemainus and came to our notice in January. The Success by 6 Coordinator for the area, Ada Mawson approached me in relation to providing a library for the community. As a result Ada, Christoph Neufeld and myself attend a meeting at Halalt in March. There is a definite need for a community Library and as a result we are now working with the community to locate a Britco module on site. Things are moving very quickly with the community as they have been committed to make this work and are doing everything that will ensure this will happen. The Rotary Club of Steveston, Chemainus and Parksville will be partnering together on this project. We expect the library to be ready for opening by His Honour before his term ends.

3. KLEMTU

This community is now firmly on our radar and I have now secured a Rotary Club to adopt the community. The Rotary Club of Saanich (after His Honour’s recent visit) will be adopting the community to start working towards a library/cultural centre. The club along with Brenda Rothwell (Success by 6), His Honor and myself need to go into the community to set things up to start the process of planning and bringing in the Britco module.

His Honour Stephen Point met with aboriginal leaders in Haida Gwaii

4. OLD MASSETT

We have had our first conference with the band members from Old Massett, myself, Beng Favreau (Literacy Haida Gwaii) and Christoph Neufeld from Britco. What has to happen now is for me to find a Rotary Club to adopt the community and start working towards getting a Britco module to the community for the first ever Aboriginal Library. The community are very excited that we are preparing to do that, having visited the community with His Honour has made it easier to get things done.

The Watchmen stand careful guard over Haida legacies in the village of Ninstints

5. FORT RUPERT

As a result of visiting this community recently with His Honour & Jamie we have had positive responses from the community. Brenda Rothwell and I, along with a representative from the community, are now going to start the process of having our first ever Elders library, specifically for the elders to go and relax, read and do their crafts. This has been something that the community really wanted so Brenda and I are setting up a conference to get things moving.

6. NEMIAH

Nemiah has just come on board in relation to wanting a community library. This is going to be another logistical challenge as Nemiah is on Chilco Lake which is 4.5-hrs drive from Williams Lake. Our Rotary folks on the ground in the area have told me that this community recently heard about the project and have seen what has happened in Toosey and Stone and are very excited that there is something like this that is available to them. Shirley Pat Gale, our main lead in the Chilcotin, has made contact with the community and we are going to set up a conference with them.

Computers are the key to literacy, as seen in the new library at Toosie

7. FORT WARE

This community has been on our radar for some time and it appears that we can get moving with them. I have two Rotary Clubs willing to partner with the community (located north of Williston Lake) so we are in the process of seeing what can be done. This location would be another huge logistical challenge to us.

8. GRAND OPENING OF THE YUNESITIN (Stone) LIBRARY CULTURAL CENTRE

We now have a date for the building to be opened, that will be September 11th, 2012 everything is moving along nicely, this is going to be a great day for His Honour and I as this is our second building to be opened.

9. UBC FACULTY OF DENTISTRY/DENTAL MISSION SOCIETY/GH – ROTARY DENTAL CLINICS

We had our third clinic on July 12,13,14, 2012 at the Hulhetun Health Centre which is located just south of Chemainus. We looked at patients from 5 communities, Halalt, Lyackson, Chemainus, Penelakut, and Malahat. Because the health centre has a state of the art dental office we will be able to do root canals as we have the top specialist in Vancouver with us as part of our team. We are also making plans for the first ever clinic for the Chilcotin area. That will be held at Anahim, tentatively to take place September 2013.

April 25, 2017

Britco Commits to Building 5 More Libraries

Britco Structures of Langley has been a prime sponsor of the Lt. Governor Steven Point’s aboriginal literacy initiative from the beginning. The company, which builds modular trailers on its property in suburban Langley, donated the first modular trailer to the Toosey Reserve near Williams Lake in 2011. Britco is now promising to get even more deeply involved in the Write to Read project.

In this video clip Britco General Manager of Leasing Christoph Neufeld explains that the response to their donation of the first trailer was so overwhelming that the company has decided to continue its involvement, but to an even greater extent. Each trailer costs about $25,000 to build, and there are also transportation costs to deliver each trailer to remote locations around the province. Nonetheless, Britco has offered to build, donate and deliver many more trailers in 2012 and 2013.

“We have committed to a total of 6 modular buildings now,” says Neufeld, and “and we may do more in the future. We are committed to be partners in the Write to Read Project, and to finding out what the First Nations needs are, and where they are located, and find out how we can help.”

The first modular building was a donation from Britco to the Toosey band of the Chilcotin Nation at Riske Creek near Williams Lake. The 40’ by 12’ trailer was towed to the reserve and installed next to the new band office, where it is acting as a library. Inside the library are several new computers, equipped with high-speed broadband connections. The library, band office and kitchen now serve as a community centre for the entire Toosey band.

April 25, 2017

Oweekeno project in Wuikinuxv Nation brings together multiple partners to “build community”

If all goes right, the construction project shaping up at Oweekeno (Rivers Inlet) can serve as a blueprint for future partnerships between First Nations people and city folk all across Canada. This project brings together a wide variety of rural and urban groups, companies, government agencies and private individuals all with a common purpose – to build community.

Oweekeno is located on the banks of the Wannock River at the entrance to Owikeno Lake east of Rivers Inlet, south of Bella Bella on the BC coastline. It’s so small and remote the village is hard to find on a map. Oweekeno is home to the 280 members of the Wuikinuxv Nation, many who live off-reserve in other areas of the province. The Wuikinuxv have an affiliation with the Oweekeno/Kitasoo/Nuxalk Tribal Council in Bella Coola.

Currently the reserve hosts a band administration office, a health centre, a K-7 school, a fire hall, an airstrip, and a newly constructed ceremonial “Big House” used for cultural purposes. Soon, however, the community will be the proud owner of a new multi-purpose flex court to be used for healthy recreational activities such as basketball, volleyball, ball hockey and tennis. This new facility is a cooperative venture between the rural Wuikinuxv and “city folks” organized under the direction of Rotarian Bob Blacker, former Regional Governor of Rotary District 5040, currently working in conjunction with His Honour Stephen Point, the Lt. Governor of BC and his new Aboriginal Literacy Project.

“This is a enormous project,” says Blacker, “and its quite a challenge to bring it all together. We’ll be doing the construction sometime this fall, I hope, when all final pieces fall in place.”

Architect Scott Kemp has drawn up plans for a covered 88 by 110-foot flex court, sitting on a cement pad and covered by an iron roof, thereby functional the entire year. The court will be surrounded by bleachers and a new library will be situated at one end where parents can watch their kids play, read books and socialize. While the community already has a Big House for formal purposes, the new development is intended to act as a community centre, bringing everyone together.

The libraries will be equipped with computers, where children can learn to become computer literate under adult supervision. But once a cyber-connection between the reserve and outside world is established, and interested parties brought together via email and video, who knows what other connections can take place?

The list of participating partners is endless. First is key sponsor Britco Structures of Langley, which has already offered to donate ten portable modular 44 by 10-foot buildings to be used as libraries and community centres on First Nation reserves around the province. The 10 modular buildings represent a $500,000 donation on the part of Britco, who will also assist with delivery of the buildings to their remote sites.

Getting a 44-foot building to a remote location like Oweekeno is just one of the many unique challenges Blacker has faced. Finding the right type of barge to off-load at the beach is one major task. Right now, Seaspan of North Vancover has offered to help with the delivery of the building, but how do you get cement, logs, rebar, a mixing plant and other materials also shipped to such a remote place?

“We’ve had offers from Western Forest Products and Interfor to help find the right size of logs,” says Blacker. “The value of the logs they are donating is over $65,000. We’ve been looking for logs up to 110 feet long, and they finally found them. The community will do the milling, cutting the logs into 4 by 12-inch sections 45 feet long. We need 6 posts 48 wide and 16 posts 36 inches wide and two beams 110 feet long and 48 inches wide just to hold up the roof.”

Then there is the question of cement. It will have to be shipped in and mixed on site, but Blacker has found a company on northern Vancouver island that can help do that job. Tonnes of rebar will need to be bought and shipped in. And just who is going to do all the construction? Well, Blacker is friends with a lot of Richmond firefighters, who have offered to volunteer their time and skills.

The cement floor can be poured in one day, but the entire building can’t be constructed in one day, so Blacker has worked with the Oweekeno community to find billets for all the firefighters. Getting all the firefighters into the remote community is also a logistical nightmare. The firefighters must all arrange to book their holidays in unison to work together as a team. Late September looks to be the first opportunity, or perhaps a bit later in the fall.

Food must be ordered, purchased, shipped and cooked for all the volunteers. The tiny Oweekeno band can’t be expected to buy it all, so the sponsoring Rotary Clubs will find the cooks to serve it. Vancouver Coastal Health has chipped in with a $15,000 grant, and the community has applied to the Western Diversification Fund for a grant to defray construction expenses.

“So far, I think the donation of time and materials alone is about $458,000,” says Blacker, all of which he has personally arranged with his long and growing list of donors. “We are developing a real team of great volunteers here, and all the donors have been very generous.”

What Blacker does not mention is that this complex project will not cost the taxpayer a penny, and that there are no bureaucratic administration costs at all. Every penny donated has gone straight into the purchase of materials. The success of the project is that “city folk” – urban companies and groups located in BC towns and cities – have decided to partner with remote rural native communities via cyberspace, bridging a huge geographical and cultural gap simply through mutual kindness and trust.

“The key to getting this project done is that it is all community based,” says architect Scott Kemp in this video clip. “We are not joining the government queue and waiting for handouts. We are simply going out and doing it ourselves, and it’s been a huge success.”

Currently the key economic activities of the Wuikinuxv are logging, salmon enhancement, commercial fishing and roe-on-kelp, and management of a tree farm license. The Nation is looking to diversify its local economy by developing plans to promote bear viewing, a run-of-the-river power project and perhaps a heli-ski tenure. Once the world hears about this amazing project, and how this unique partnership between town and country was created (and, also, where the heck Oweekeno is actually located) then perhaps new outside investment in the community will be the next natural development.

Finally, when the public learns about the partnerships that Blacker and Point have forged between such disparate entities, who knows what kinds of donations may pour in? Rotary clubs across the province of BC have a dozen more literacy projects already scheduled, and not a word has been written in the media yet about their “blueprint to build community.” Watch out when it does, because as Kemp says in this video clip this is a project built on sturdy ground that can only grow bigger the more partners become involved.

April 25, 2017

Daybreak club is first past the post

Shirley Pat Gale (right) of Williams Lake Daybreak Rotary Club with members of the Toosey band

Anyone who has ever met her will agree that Shirley-Pat Gale is a human dynamo. The driving force from the Williams Lake Daybreak Rotary Club is the hidden secret behind forming the partnership that resulted in the opening of the Toosey Library at Klesko (Riske Creek).

The combined library/gathering place at Klesko is historic as it becomes the first Rotary/First Nations partnership project to be completed and opened in British Columbia. Many more such partnerships are sure to follow.

As is frequently the case with Rotary anywhere in the world, it happens that there is more than one Rotary Club in town, and in this case its in the town of Williams Lake. Shirley-Pat with the Daybreak Club has a partnership with Klesko. The other club, the Williams Lake Rotary Club, is also involved in an aboriginal literacy project, but their affiliation is with the Stone band of the Chilcotin nation. That reserve is located much further west on the Chilcotin plateau.

Stay tuned for news about the Stone/Williams Lake partnership. Meantime, cheers to Shirley-Pat for being the driving force behind this great project, the first of many more in the province of British Columbia, creating what may become a blueprint for many other communities around the world to follow.

April 25, 2017

Write to Read project detailed in major Vancouver Sun column

The Write to Read Project finally went “public” on Tuesday October 2nd when highly acclaimed Vancouver Sun columnist Stephen Hume wrote a detailed explanation of the project on the editorial pages of the Vancouver Sun. This excellent outline of the project (Goal of literacy brings together public/private coalition) details all the many “partners” involved in this informal coalition.

The column credits Lt. Governor Stephen Hume, the Government House Foundation and Rotarian Bob Blacker for initiating the project, but the list of partners in the coalition is endless. This includes Rotary Clubs from Williams Lake Daybreak, Williams Lake Rotary, North Vancouver Lionsgate, Langley Central, Steveston, Chemainus, Ladysmith, Qualicum Beach, Parksville, Chilliwack, Surrey, Saanich and Port McNeill. Other companies and organizations named in the column were Britco Structures, B.C. Ferries, Richmond Fire Department 1286, the RCMP, the Coast Guard, Orca Books, and Success by Six.

First Nations partners named in the coalition by Hume include Toosey, Halalt, Penelakut, Kingcome Inlet, Old Massett at Haida Gwaii, Tsawout, Rivers Inlet, Yunesitin, Kluskus, Nazko, Skatin, Bella Bella and Lheidi T’ennah.

Not named in the column but also partnering in the project are the UBC School of Dentistry, architect Scott Kemp, Seaspan, Western Forest Products, Interfor, Vancouver Coastal Health, the Western Diversification Fund and the list just keeps getting longer. The full article can be read in Stephen Hume’s column in the Vancouver Sun.

April 25, 2017

Success by Six assists with aboriginal literacy

t’s as easy as a click of a mouse. No matter if a child lives in the big city or in a remote First Nations community, access to a computer leads to the same results. Interest in literacy grows immediately a child has access to books, teachers, guidance and a computer. The early years are the most important, as non-profit agency Success by Six has proved in its work.

Success By Six is an early childhood development initiative dedicated to providing all children with a good start in life. It helps to ensure that children ages 0 to 6 develop the emotional, social, cognitive, and physical skills they need as they enter school.

Success By Six builds and enhances community through engaging citizens in early childhood development and funding programs that strengthen services for young children and their families. Funded programs include literacy, nutrition, children’s play, parenting and family skills development.

Provincial manager Kim Adamson explains over a cup of coffee that Success by Six is partnering with the Aboriginal Literacy Project and Write to Read to bring this program to several aboriginal communities. Sponsored by the Credit Unions of BC and the United Way of the Lower Mainland, Success by Six hopes to expand its work in native communities throughout BC with public recognition and contributions.

April 25, 2017

Lions Gate Rotary of North Vancouver partners with Oweekeno

It may seem a strange mix, but an upscale Vancouver community organization has agreed to “partner” with a remote First Nations band to promote literacy and other initiatives. The Lionsgate Rotary Club of North Vancouver has made an official commitment to assist the Oweekeno people located at remote Rivers Inlet on the British Columbia coast.

The Rotary Club of North Vancouver Lions Gate was selected as the Outstanding Rotary club in District 5040 for 2010-11. The club is active in many areas of service, including Youth Exchange, RYLA and North Vancouver Youth Week. They sponsor a 60-member Interact club at Windsor Secondary and at Balmoral Secondary. For 15 years the club has staged the Canada Day at Waterfront Park that attracts 20,000 people annually.

Their international service includes a joint project in Indonesia for trades training for deaf and hard of hearing young adults.

This year the club has decided to take on yet another new project and support the Aboriginal Club Literacy initiative originally founded by former Lt. Governor Steven Point and his former aide-de-camp, long time Rotarian Bob Blacker. Lions Gate Rotary member Shirley Robertson reports that the club is interested in explaining its partnership to anyone who is interested, and is pleased to accept offers of support from the public. The club will be working with Oweekeno to help build a library, community centre and sportsplex at the village this summer.

April 25, 2017

W2R to deliver library to Bella Bella after fire

The small First Nations town of Bella Bella on the BC coast was devastated by a fire this summer that burned down the general store, including the library. Thanks to a generous offer from main Write to Read sponsor Britco Structures, with assistance from BC Ferries, a portable trailer is being delivered to the town to serve as a library. This story in the Vancouver Sun provides all the details.

http://www.vancouversun.com/Coastal+town+picks+pieces+following+devastating+July+fire/8768112/story.html

April 25, 2017

Write to Read helps bring dental services to Anaham band in Chilcotin

Although the main focus of the Write to Read project is partnering with First Nations communities in BC to assist with the Lt. Governor’s literacy project, building those partnerships sometimes results in other offers of assistance. The UBC School of Dentistry has partnered to bring dental services to several small First Nations communities, as this story (below) in the Williams Lake Tribune attest.

Williams Lake Tribune
Wed Aug 7 2013

Byline: Monica Lamb-Yorski
They may have got more than they gave, said University of B.C. Dean of Dentistry Dr. Charles Shuler, referring to a recent UBC dentistry clinic held at the Anaham Reserve west of Williams Lake.
“From my perspective we did a lot of great dentistry, yet I think we might have learned more than the service we provided because we learned a lot about the area.”
The Chilcotin is far from his original home of Los Angeles, but it is a beautiful region, he said.
Between July 25 and 28, the UBC school of dentistry offered a dental mission in co-operation with the Tl’et’inqox-t’in (Anaham) government office.
A team of eight dentists, a dental hygienist, a dental assistant, two instructors, 15 students and two Rotarians travelled to Anaham, and with the help of health centre staff delivered dental care.
“It was the first time we’d been to Anaham,” Shuler said. “We’ve done clinics around the province, some in First Nations reserves on Vancouver Island and in First Nations clinics in the Downtown Eastside.”
Around 75 people of all ages from various First Nations communities attended the clinic, some returning for multiple appointments.
“It was jam-packed, even on the last day people were phoning in for appointments,” Anaham Chief Joe Alphonse said.
“People who came the first day went back home into their communities and rounded up more.”
Shuler said there was an interesting energy and enthusiasm on the part of the people from UBC and the community.
“The patients seemed to be extremely appreciative of everything. Of all the people who were there, no one left saying, ‘I hate to go to the dentist,’ they all said, ‘this was fun.'”
In more remote areas, like Anaham, distance can be a problem, he said. It’s an hour and 45 minutes from Anaham to Williams Lake, a distance people probably aren’t willing to travel unless they are in severe pain.
“I think there’s also been a historical problem with Non-Insured Health Benefits compensation. Some dentists don’t like dealing with NIHB so I think some patients don’t get accepted by dentists,” Shuler said.
The feedback from the students was extremely positive and Shuler has received e-mails from the students saying they can’t wait to go back.
One of those is fourth year student Nadine Priya KandolaListen. It was her first visit to a reserve in the Chilcotin and an opportunity she described as “once in a life time.”
Originally from Kelowna, KandolaListen has been a student leader for one of UBC’s Vancouver clinics, but had never volunteered out of Vancouver before the trip to Anaham.
“They really made an effort to welcome us and include us in their customs,” she said. “I don’t think we were all expecting that because in the past there have been a lot of people who are afraid of dentists.”
After all, when 27 dentist-types arrive in a little community, it can be intimidating,” she said. “We all became like family.”
KandolaListen will graduate in 2014. Due to her experience at the Anaham clinic she’s inspired to go north for at least a year to work in a community where there is no dentist.
“Being on these trips you really see the need in some areas,” she said.
Recently retired Williams Lake dentist Christine Constabel and Williams Lake dentist Hannah Tsao were also part of the team.
Constabel said she “poked her nose” into the project early along and ended up being a substitute team leader.
Constabel credited the blitz’s success to the work the First Nations community did with bringing patients to the health centre for appointments.
“We were there at 8:30 a.m. Friday and Saturday and had three people there waiting for us on Saturday morning,” Constabel said.
The visitors also gained cultural experience.
They toured fishing sites at Farwell Canyon, saw the Woman Who Turned to Stone, and participated in traditional games.
“I had never seen the Woman Who Turned To Stone before,” Constabel said.
“It’s a natural sculpture along the Chilcotin River. It’s a very beautiful site and we enjoyed seeing it.”
They also participated in a sweat lodge on Saturday evening and it was a first for everyone, Shuler said.
When the Anaham health centre was first built, the community had no funding for a dentist, yet went ahead and included a state-of-the-art dentist office, hoping in the future they might be able to offer dentistry, Alphonse explained.
That has been realized partly with the recent addition of Dr. Nick Girn, who through Health Canada delivers a dentistry clinic in Anaham every other week.
It was Girn’s clinic that first inspired Constabel to question the need for the blitz, but she heard loudly from the Anaham band there are more patients than Girn can accommodate.
“I connected with Dr. Grin afterwards to let him know who we had seen that might come for follow up because we didn’t finish the work,” Constabel said.
“I also wanted to tell him we’d used up the large sized gloves in the clinic. ”
To augment the existing dentistry office, UBC brought five portable dental units and portable dentals chairs and instruments.
Thompson Rivers University Williams Lake grants officer Shirley-Pat Chamberlain, who participated on behalf of the Rotary Club of Williams Lake Daybreak, said she hoped the relationship with UBC’s School of Dentistry continues to grow.
“Interested individuals can start their pre-dental studies locally with a savings of almost $10,000 in comparison to cost in the lower mainland. These credits would then be transferable to the programs offered by the UBC School of Dentistry,” Chamberlain said.
Dr. Evan Wiens, who graduated from the school in 2012, helped organize the Anaham clinic.
Comparing it to other clinics, he said the response from Anaham was very warm, which helped make the clinic excellent.
“I would love to come back there next year,” he said.
A measure of the clinic’s success is the fact they were able to offer $18, 000 worth of dentistry for free, Wiens said.
“It’s not to highlight the money so much as to show that even a weekend can make a difference.”
Copyright 2013 Williams Lake Tribune

April 25, 2017

Old Massett library set to open

By Michael McCarthy

Certainly it doesn’t look like much sitting forlornly on the factory grounds of Britco Structures in Langley, but the story of the opening of the new First Nations library in Old Massett is as fascinating as some of the books that will be available on loan from the library. As far as I can patch them together from various sources, the “behind the scenes” developments that go into the delivery of these modules read like the plot of a mystery novel.

Britco Structures has been at the forefront of the entire literacy project, originally offering to donate a 40 by 12-foot module left over from the 2010 Olympic Games, where it was used as a broadcast facility. The modules are put together at the factory in Langley. How they finally end up in places as remote as Old Massett is a different story.

A relationship must first develop between a First Nation (usually in a remote area) and a partnering Rotary Club, always located in a town or city. Rotary clubs are autonomous and thereby choose their own projects, staffed by volunteers, who are often small business owners. Their partners are First Nations people living far from their partnering towns. An example is North Vancouver Lionsgate club partnering with Oweekenno. In many ways it’s a marriage of opposites.

These two groups need to agree to work together on a specific project. That project is usually a library, although some projects may go in different directions, like the proposed 4-season sportsplex planned for Oweekeno (Rivers Inlet) designed by architect Scott Kemp. The UBC School of Dentistry in Point Grey is another partner, volunteering their interns’ services every year from their campus at UBC and traveling to First Nations territory as far afield as the Chilcotin.

These unique relationships would not be possible without the spark provided by former B.C. Lieutenant-Governor Steven Point, who resides in Chilliwack but worked from Government House in Victoria during his tenure. Point made aboriginal literacy a priority during his term in office, an initiative continued by current Lt. Gov. Judy Guichon and the Government House Literacy Foundation in Victoria. Are you following the partners and geography so far? It gets even more complex.

Point’s aide de camp during his term of office was Bob Blacker, a Rotarian and formerly District Governor of Rotary District 5040, comprised of approximately 100 Rotary clubs in B.C. and northern Washington. Blacker lives in Richmond, a suburb of Vancouver, but frequently travels with the Lt. Governor to various events around the province. When Point mentioned his interests in aboriginal literacy, Blacker stepped in to offer his Rotary contacts. After all, just like McDonalds, it seems there is a Rotary club in every town in North America, so now you have a distribution network all set up, and operated by professionals.

OK, so you have a 40-foot module sitting at a factory in Langley, and a request for a library in Old Massett (or the Chilcotin, or any remote village up and down the B.C. coast), so how do you get the library stocked with books and shipped to its destination? Apparently there is a group Blacker calls his LRTs, the Library Rapid Response Team of professional librarians led by Bonnie Sutherland, another Rotarian, who specializes in delivering computers and books to projects in Africa, a project named Afretech, of which I need to learn much more very soon because Bonnie is an expert in these kinds of aid projects. These librarians, upon request, fly into action and choose the books and create an archiving system on the computer, just like any library, although in the instance of Old Massett the elders of that community may have chosen the books. More to learn.

Once the books are stocked, then the 40-foot module has to find its way to its destination. The very first module was trucked by Britco, at the company’s expense, to the Chilcotin. (I think it was the Stone band at Anaham, but I need to check; could have been the Toosey folks at Riske Creek). But getting a module shipped to Old Massett is like sending a space rocket to Mars. Easy in theory, but there are expenses and other logistical difficulties involved. How’s your geography doing so far?

Enter B.C. Ferries. Certainly they have ships that make the run up the Inside Passage, ferries that can take a 40-foot module, but it’s an expensive route to operate. Calls and discussions took place and evidently BC Ferries checked out the Write to Read Project and decided that it, too, wanted to become a partner. So, as of today, BC Ferries has absorbed the shipping costs of the module and the tractor trailer on which it sits to its dock in Skidegate, which is located on the south end of Graham Island in Haida Gwaii. Get out your map and check where it is, because we are still not in Old Massett.

Britco driver Ron Fisher will then drive the rig up the island to its intended destination in the village of Old Massett, which is tribal territory located just to the west of the town of Massett. Evidently the town of Massett has an airport, but how do you get a semi-trailer loaded on to a plane? No, somebody has to drive it here, so kudos to Ron for that.

On the other end, if I can track everyone involved by following a trail of emails, it’s the Old Massett Village Council that got the ball rolling, with Beng Favreau of Literacy Haida Gwaii coordinating efforts. They decided on a Sneak Peek Event where the community was invited to come help select the books they would love to see in the library. Some books have already ordered and loans of aboriginal books and resources (digital and print) have been requested that will be used as sample books for future browsing and selection. Books with a focus on aboriginal themes and authors.
The library will be somewhat ready, though not fully functional, to create some spark and pride in the community before the official opening in October. Lt. Governor Guichon will be on hand for that event, the opening of the best First Nations library (with FN Authors!) in Canada.

Coordinating operations at the Britco end is Vice President of Sales Christoph Neufeld, who will be joined in Old Massett at the official library opening by Britco VP
Chris Gardner. By my estimate Britco has donated almost a dozen modules to the literacy project, materials worth about half a million dollars. That is really the definition of ‘social responsibility.’

It reads like a mystery novel, or a jigsaw puzzle with lots of little pieces that need to be assembled in the right order. I’m still trying to fit all the pieces together and learn the names of all the people involved and who did what. But in the end, First Nations people – some of the finest storytellers in the world with a storied history of oral communications dating back many centuries – will finally get access to what the rest of us in cities and towns consider a simple community right, a library stocked with books and computers. That’s why it’s called the Write to Read project. All based on good faith between multiple partners from different walks of life all agreeing to work together for the benefit of everyone. Congrats to all involved.