Heiltsuk First Nation

First Nations across the province are undertaking clean energy programs with provincial funding designed to help ditch the use of dirty diesel fuel.

Tension reached a high point during a trauma-healing ceremony when a hereditary chief walked across a sand-covered floor and returned the gift he had received from Vancouver Police Chief Adam Palmer.

Maxwell Johnson looked out at empty chairs reserved for two Vancouver police officers who didn't attend an event originally intended to be an Indigenous apology ceremony for the false arrests of Johnson and his granddaughter nearly three years ago.

The sticking point to moving forward with long-planned marine protected areas on B.C.'s Central Coast is the DFO Pacific branch's objections to proposed fisheries measures, say First Nations.

The Haíɫzaqv Nation on B.C.'s isolated central coast is shaping a climate plan that tackles emissions and better reflects the community's values and sacred interdependence with nature in their territory.

There is a strong alignment between clean energy project development and the principles of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP), said Eryn Stewart, the managing director of the non-profit Indigenous Clean Energy (ICE). 

The canoe’s resurgence signifies more than reviving an essential means of transport, it conveys freedom and the enduring strength of First Nations and their resistance to colonization.

An Indigenous man from British Columbia has filed complaints with the BC Human Rights Tribunal and the Canadian Human Rights Commission after he and his granddaughter were handcuffed when they tried to open a bank account.

It was a difficult decision to sign a benefit sharing agreement with Coastal GasLink that would allow for a natural gas pipeline through the Wet'suwet'en territory, but a necessary one, an elected band council member says.

The federal government has been told to reevaluate its 2018 contract with a New Brunswick-based company for two emergency response vessels on B.C.'s coast. 

The Transportation Safety Board of Canada says the second mate on the Nathan E. Stewart was by himself on the tug's bridge and had fallen asleep when the tug-barge​ ran aground on Oct. 31, 2016, resulting in the release of about 110,000 litres of diesel fuel in Heiltsuk First Nation territorial waters near Bella Bella, B.C.

Stormy weather left the American-owned Jake Shearer vessel, carrying up to 10,000 tons of fuel stranded, just off the coast of Bella Bella. The vessel was in distress just near Goose Island. This is an essential food harvesting spot for the Heiltsuk.

B.C. has introduced pollution prevention regulations to hold transport companies moving petroleum products across the province responsible for the costs of responding to and cleaning up spills.

At the time, diesel was spilling from a tug boat that hit a rock and later sank after missing a key navigational turn.

Power has been restored to a village near B.C.'s Great Bear Rainforest, but the community’s chief says frustration lingers because members of the First Nation had to fight the blaze on their own.