Weakened Indigenous street-naming guidelines pass

The City of Regina is preparing itself for a debate on divisive street names like Dewdney Avenue.

The issue came up at Monday’s council meeting, as new street naming guidelines passed with wide support. They apply only to new neighbourhoods, but council also triggered a process to guide renaming existing streets. It directed staff to draw up “criteria” for addressing the historical legacy of a street’s namesake.

That could apply to Edgar Dewdney, a former Indian Commissioner who was instrumental in the creation of the residential school system.

Coun. Andrew Stevens said Dewdney comes up frequently in conversations with Joely Bigeagle-kequahtooway, an advocate who is leading a push to rechristen the street Buffalo Avenue.

During Monday’s meeting, he asked whether he can now tell Bigeagle-kequahtooway that a process will soon be in place. City Clerk Jim Nicol confirmed that he can, with the criteria due by midnext year.

Bigeagle-kequahtooway said she may well use the new process. She said she’s still gathering signatures to support her bid, and plans to push it through, one way or another.

“I’ll force their hand,” she told the Leader-post on Tuesday. “If they’re not finished that criteria, I’ll still submit it.”

She seemed even more skeptical about the guidelines for new neighbourhoods, which include targets for Indigenous names.

“It sounds like lip service to me,” she said. “It looks good on paper, but how are you actually going to enforce that?”

The guidelines had gone through months of twists and turns at Regina Planning Commission, which weakened a proposal to increase the proportion of streets names bearing an Indigenous connection — currently at less than one per cent.

Administration initially proposed quotas of 25 per cent for local streets and 50 per cent of parks in new neighbourhoods. But the commission opted to change the quotas to “targets.”

Council retained that change, while axing a measure that would give a civic naming committee the final say on naming local roads. That’s currently up to developers, who select from a committee-approved list. Council opted to keep things that way.

Both moves troubled BigeagleKequahtooway. She has little confidence that targets will be enough to push developers to change their practice.

“If it’s not necessarily going to make it harder for the developers, then what’s going to change?” she asked.

Coun. Bob Hawkins, who pushed to get rid of the quotas at planning commission, agreed that developers shouldn’t have the final say. So did Stevens. He suggested that council was caving into pressure from home builders.

In a letter submitted to council, representatives from Dream and Forster Harvard development companies argued that losing control over naming would interfere with “the ability to create a cohesive brand” for their communities.

“I’m a bit concerned that a single letter from developers has us changing policy,” Stevens said. “It may be a testament to their influence.”

But Stevens still views the new guidelines as a positive step in repairing Regina’s relationship with its Indigenous residents.

“I think it’s actually one of the most important commitments to truth and reconciliation, in terms of changing the streetscape and how we identify our community,” he said.

The move also earned accolades from Vice-chief Heather Bear of the Federation of Sovereign Indigenous Nations. While she had questions over the shift from quotas to targets, she expressed hope that the “original spirit and intent” of the guidelines will hold up.

“I applaud any time you can honour Indigenous peoples and bring attention to their contributions,” she said.

“I’m delighted that our First Nations can be honoured, our heroes.”

For Bear, the names of Indigenous veterans would be a good place to start. She also mentioned champion powwow dancers from Saskatchewan and other Indigenous athletes.

The guidelines passed on Monday will govern far more than Indigenous naming. They will also limit the number of characters in a name and prevent the use of the sound-alike names common in the Greens on Gardiner, Wascana View and Maple Ridge.