A controversial road project in west-central Saskatchewan has been put on hold.
In recent days, local First Nations have been lobbying the government to halt construction of an eight-mile gravel road, west of Biggar and about 150 kilometres from Saskatoon, because of the existence of ancient Indigenous artifacts on a strip of land within the route.
Construction on the road, being built by the Rural Municipality of Winslow, was slated to go ahead Monday.
However, Thursday afternoon the province confirmed the RM has decided to delay the project for the next few weeks anyway.
Nevertheless, Ministry of Parks, Culture and Sport Assistant Deputy Minister Candace Caswell says the province has no intention of stopping the project if the RM still decides it wants to move ahead.
“Everything in this project has followed the legislation,” she says. “The process happened as it does with many projects that we do throughout the year and the artifacts were identified, steps were taken to contain and capture what is found within that 100-foot wide strip and really the opportunity for them to move forward is there.”
Indigenous artifacts found on the site include a cairn, tepee rings and pottery items.
Deeper excavation still has uncovered a knife-like instrument made of obsidian that could be as old as 10,000 years.
A local ranching family notified area First Nations about the findings after a private archeologist working as part of the road construction project uncovered them.
The government has known about the existence of the artifacts since last year.
Caswell admits the province did not consult with local First Nations after the artifacts were uncovered because existing legislation says it doesn’t have to.
“Within the legislation, the duty to consult and that doesn’t tie to the identification of artifacts in this case. If this was the identification of burial sites, there’s another process that we follow but the identification of artifacts, the process doesn’t move forward into the duty to consult with the neighbouring First Nations.”
Area First Nations held a press conference at the Federation of Sovereign Indigenous Nations offices in Saskatoon Thursday morning to voice their displeasure on how the provincial government has handled the discovery of the artifacts and road construction project.
Battlefords Agency Tribal Chiefs executive director Neil Sasakamoose, which represents seven-area First Nations, says the provincial government has dropped the ball on the issue thus far.
“The most senior archeologist in the heritage branch, after all the findings, contracting, a third-party company called heritage to go do the digs, the senior archeologist gives it the green light to proceed,” he says.
Former Red Pheasant First Nation chief Sheldon Wuttunee was one of the first people to be alerted about the findings of the artifacts after the local ranching family contacted one of his friends.
He says if existing laws don’t require the government to consult with First Nations when such artifacts are uncovered in the province, maybe its time to change the legislation.
“These pieces of legislation that are consistently referred to, that often times have adverse effects on our people, our communities, our leadership, they need to be changed,” he says. “And we need to get to a table to change these collectively if those are the rules we want to work within.”
(PHOTO: Former Red Pheasant First Nation chief Sheldon Wuttnee is involved with a group of First Nations that have serious concerns about a road construction project proceeding after ancient Indigenous artifacts were uncovered on the route. Photo courtesy of Sheldon Wuttnee Facebook page.)