ryersonparksign

- by Anne Finlay-Stewart, Editor

Mayor Ian Boddy put forward a notice of motion at this evening's council meeting, looking for a staff report concerning a review of the City's parks and facilities naming policy.

Referencing the remains of 215 children on the grounds of the Kamloops Indian Residential School, Boddy asked that the Ryerson Park sign be removed.

A recent online petition asking for the re-naming of that park already has almost 1000 signatures - a number well over 5% of the adult population of the City.  Another initiative of respect for the Indigenous land on which our City is built and its people, supported by this author and local heritage-keeper Aly Boltman, is to take Mary Miller's name off a park on a Nawash burial ground, and move it to the playground on 8th Street East and 5th Avenue.

Although he had no specific details yet as Covid protocols are clarified,  Boddy announced that the formal dedication of the Gitche Namewikwedong Bridge on 10th Street would take place on National Indigenous Peoples Day, Monday, June 21st, the day after the summer solstice.