Tla’amin Nation hegus John Hackett wrote to City of Powell River Council requesting the name “Powell” be removed from the name of our city, since its namesake, Israel Powell, reportedly did not have a good reputation concerning the Indigenous population.
Recently, Art Richards, who decided to look into the life of Israel Powell on his own, spent weeks researching and looking for information. He approached council with a request to make his presentation and possibly have council hire a biographer to verify his findings, since there was some information he thought was relevant to the cause [“City of Powell River Council briefs: Voted down” April 6].
Richards was given permission to speak at a city meeting, but when he arrived, council ultimately silenced him by a vote of four to three.
The next morning, on air, I heard councillor Maggie Hathaway state that it would be a huge waste of council’s time if they had to listen to every citizen who wanted to speak about everything that bothered them. Isn’t it part of their job to listen to the concerns of their fellow citizens?
Could it be that one or more of the members who voted against Richards’ appearance have ulterior motives, which prevent them from being fair in the representation of the city? There are always two sides to every issue, and as of yet, we have not heard the other side. Mr. Richards wanted that rectified.
Richards has rights to have the freedom of expressing his concern with what he saw was an imbalance of information. What is council afraid of, or who are they afraid of? Why was Richards’ freedom of expression squashed?
It seems the council and some supporters have decided this is “a fait accompli” and are set to pick a new name. Changing it to some other “more acceptable” name will not change events of the past. There have been lots of apologies, money, land grants, et cetera, to rectify those decisions. Has it helped?
I hope a fair and informative decision can be made, not like the one in the regional district, which changed from Powell River to qathet. Who did that? This is democracy?
My fellow residents, get the facts straight as everything you hear is not always true.
Antoinette Knight
Westview Avenue
