The Wet’suwet’en First Nation held a ground breaking ceremony last Wednesday, in the new subdivision in Palling west of Burns Lake for their new hall and health clinic.
“Wet’suwet’en First Nation has experienced so much tragedy since the beginning of this current councils term” said Chief Karen Ogen.
“We had the forest fire in 2010 where we had to evacuate one of our communities. To date we have had approximately eight deaths within our community and then we had the mill explosion [Babine Forest Products] on Jan. 20, 2012 that took one of our community member’s husband and our relative. We are rising from the ashes and we are going to flourish and prosper. We want positive events and encouraging news for our people. We want to come out of the valley of suffering and mourning and we want to live life again but not forget our loved ones that have gone before us.”
“Our elders and hereditary chiefs want to celebrate the goodness and share our happy moments with others. This will be the start of good things to come for Wet’suwet’en First Nation. We proclaim and decree prosperity over our nation. We have survived so many atrocities,” said Chief Ogen.
She also stated that construction will begin immediately and their hopes are to have the building mostly completed within six months.