Culture & Reconciliation

Last November, Chief Wilton Littlechild, Mayor Don Iveson and MLA Rod Loyola sat with Edmonton Heritage Council’s board and staff to speak about their vision of how Edmontonians would live into (and beyond) the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s (TRC) Calls to Action.At the time, the release of the final report of the TRC was a few weeks off. But it was abundantly clear for EHC that the path of reconciliation (and the specific TRC Calls to Action) was one that we would need to “live into” as members of the communities and peoples bound by Treaty 6.Each of our guests that November evening brought their own remarkable stories: Chief Littlechild as a residential school survivor, community leader, athlete and TRC commissioner; Mayor Iveson as an honorary witness at the final TRC event in Edmonton in 2014 drawing on power of that experience in defining his mayoralty; and Mr. Loyola’s childhood experience coming to Alberta in the wake of the Pinochet coup d’état and dictatorship—and the subsequent rupture and dislocation of Chilean families.That initial conversation confirmed we needed to learn more and also help well Edmontonians learn more. We’ve continued the internal discussion in different ways: planning responses to specific TRC Calls to Action, reviewing our programs to support individuals and organizations committed to reconciliation, and encouraging all people and organizations we work with to find a meaningful path in this important time in Edmonton’s and the country’s history. We’ve supported work in the community such as Reconciling Edmonton, the Ghosts of Camsell and the related Camsell Hospital Symposium and film production projects, or the good work of the Mill Woods Living History Project on the Papaschase First Nation.