KELLY ROAD

REMAINS TOP OF MIND FOR MANY LETTER WRITERS,

The name change for Kelly Road Secondary is complicated and controversial.

I followed the rules the school district set out. I provided an email submission. The email requested a place at the April 7 meeting. There is 30 minutes at the beginning of the board meeting to have these submissions read, with five minutes for each presentation. It wasn’t read because the name change wasn’t on the agenda. So I will present it here.

Truth and reconciliation requires truth. As a layman historian, I have spent years studying the history of our region. There is much Lheili ‘Tenneh history in our region that the public does not know, and I hope that in the coming days more of their history is known.

Moving forward, it is important that the truth is told. We should not substitute or act on questionable history when we have accounts that can be verified. We should not discard oral history, but there is a protocol to follow to help ensure accuracy and veracity.

I have found it very difficult to find evidence for the claims that the Hart area was regularly used by the Lheidli ‘Tenneh for berry picking and grizzly bear hunting before white settlers came into the area. What I have found is that from 1350 to 1850, there was an ice age in the northern hemisphere. It was the coldest time in recorded human history. It would have been extremely difficult for people to live in the Upper Fraser watershed. The same is true of the Nechako watershed below the Isle Pierre rapids. The fact that there is no village site remains in this area supports this theory.

Berry picking is not an activity unique to the Lheidli “Tenneh, and would not have occurred in a significant way in the Hart until around the year 1850 because of the ice age. The Giscome portage and the Salmon River short cut weren’t discovered until 1860. If people were in the area before that they would have known about these trails. The Salmon River comes within eight miles of Summit lake.

Before guns were used for hunting, people did not hunt grizzly bears the way it is portrayed in the movies. When people hunted bear,s they would wait until fall. They would watch to see where the bear made its den; bears don’t go directly into a den. They go in and sleep then come back out several times. This is how the hunters could know where the den was. They would wait until the bear was hibernating and kill it while it was sleeping.

When the fur traders arrived, they brought firearms. Muzzle loading guns were not suitable for hunting grizzly bears. You needed to be close because they were not accurate and they lost power quickly. It wasn’t until cartridgeloading rifles were available that grizzlies could be hunted. From 1870 to 1910, bears were slaughtered at such a rate that they nearly became extinct. During the salmon run, bears would come to the rivers. They were an easy kill with a heavy rifle from a boat. They were slaughtered like the buffalo herds of the plains.

In 1912, the B.C. Government stopped all bear hunting in this area. This was one of the causes of poverty at Fort George.

The two stories about berry picking and grizzly bear hunting that were presented were not “oral traditions.” They were just “good old days stories.” In view of the fact of the little ice age happening, the possibility of people surviving a winter in Fort George without steel axes or fabric clothing is remote. There is historical evidence that the Lheidli “Tenneh extensively used the Fort George Canyon area in pre-European times, but none for the Hart area.

I encourage the board to study the historical facts that are known and properly research the oral traditions to gain a better understanding of the true history of the area. We all need better evidence before we can support this name change.

During the COVID-19 crisis, governments are asking citizens to trust and respect them. The City of Prince George changed the name of Fort George Park in one meeting without public input. You are not making it easy to present other points of view.

Trust and respect is necessary for our democracy to work. Allan Lund, Prince George STAND UP FOR KRSS

I have watched with interest the debacle of the renaming of Kelly Road Secondary. School District 57 has admitted that they did not do their due diligence in canvasing the public about their feelings in the renaming.

Superintendent Anita Richardson was going to meet with students at the school to obtain their views. The public meeting was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic so a glossy online engagement questionnaire has been published. A time line on this questionnaire of “how did we get here” states events that happened Sept. 2020 and Nov. 29, 2020. Does the district have a crystal ball to foresee future events? I hope this is not an indication of a “done deal” and the district is only going through the motions to appease the public.

If the district, with all their high paid administrators whose salaries have continued through these difficult times, cannot get their dates straight, I question the veracity of the balance of the “information” provided in this brochure. Me thinks too much gloss to impress and not enough substance.

For decades, administrators have used school names as a means to foster pride in student populations yet a minority group can request a name change and the current board can unanimously approve that request without public consultation. Am I wrong in thinking some elected trustees are pushing their own personal agendas to the detriment of other stakeholders? To me, the school district is guilty of racism by not providing the public dialogue necessary to foster understanding in something that should be as simple as naming a school.

Prince George, the public questionnaire is accessed online through the SD57 website until Friday, Apr 17. If you have not done so already, I urge you to logon and have your voice and opinion heard.

Hopefully this is what democracy is about. L. Fernett, Vanderhoof GO, ROADRUNNERS!

I was a PE teacher and coach at KRSS for 31 years, from 1972 to 2003. Through those years, I became a large part of the community and school. I watched two major expansions. I am not in favour of any name change or addition to the name. KRSS is an established institution within the Hart community. I taught children of former students. KRSS has a fantastic history in academics and sports. I coached close to 50 different teams through the years. The colours and the roadrunner are well known through out the province. In The Citizen Extra of Thursday, Dec. 28, 2017, is an excellent article about the history and activities of KRSS.

I don’t understand how an outside small group can impose a name change on a much larger group of cohesive Hart Highway residents that have supported KRSS through so many years.

The naming of the school was very appropriate. John Kelly was an important pioneer of early Prince George. He owned the area and logged it, was an important supporter of the early Horticultural Society and spearheaded the organization of the PGX. The famous Kelly Cup (curling trophy) was donated by him. It is also rumoured that he donated the land for the original elementary school. Any name change would indeed be an insult to his and his family’s legacy.

As trustees, you have been elected to make many huge choices and decisions. But, these should be educational decisions. This proposal is not in that category. This proposal has nothing to do with reconciliation. In fact, the way it was introduced was wrong and has caused a huge backlash within the Hart community.

I hope you have been following the site on Facebook entitled “Don’t Rename Kelly Road Secondary School.” That should indicate to you that the backlash is indeed real and widespread. Introducing this proposal during the blockades across Canada was not wise. You have pitted one group against another. Racism has become part of the equation and shouldn’t be. Can you imagine if it was suggested that Duchess Park Secondary’s name be changed?

This should not be an issue. In these troubled times (pandemic), I find that I should not be concerning myself with this at all and neither should the board. The trustees all have a lot more important problems to be solved in the education field. Please rescind this issue and make it go away. Remember that reconciliation should come from within not from without. The new school is an extension of the old and will add to the old building’s legacy in the future!

I put a lot of “blood, sweat, tears and cheers” into teaching and coaching (as did many others) at KRSS. We are all proud of the accomplishments of the institution called KRSS and would like to see those triumphs continue under the umbrella of the Royal Blue/White/ Kelly Green colours and the uncatchable roadrunner. Walter Brown, Prince George IT’S ABOUT THE HART

There is a little cliché that reminds us that if we don’t stand for something, we’ll fall for anything.

I’d like to express my thanks to the people form the Hart community for standing strong amid attempts to rename their school, thereby opening the conversation to feedback from the public. I was even more disheartened upon setting foot into the school board office to see that the School District 57 sign was encased in First Nations arts, giving an impression of something other than neutrality. It left me wondering why the Pride rainbow did not adorn the walkway and just what our tax dollars are doing.

Being a person who sees no paint in making a big deal of the problem, I would rather express my concerns through helping to create a solution. The rapidly changing social fabric of our time is creating a vital need for task committees to be focused on just what equity, diversity and inclusion really mean. It is much too important to be doing it off the side of someone’s desk, especially someone who is not familiar with how re-branding takes place.

There are many interest groups trying to infer subtle brights (and branding) to our public property. We need neutral, informed citizen groups (and experts) to evaluate what our public brand really is. We need to consider everything from environmental, race, politics, war heroes, gender, age, immigrants, marginalized groups, etc., while keeping in mind our rural and urban nature. We need to think about just what our northern spirit represents to us, the citizens. Rita Wiebe, Prince George