SLATE FALLS FIRST NATION, Ont. – Long-term drinking water advisories that had been in effect in a Northwestern Ontario First Nations community for more than a decade have been lifted.
A new water treatment plant in Slate Falls First Nation officially opened on Tuesday, allowing nearly a dozen drinking advisories that had been in place for the community to be removed last month after final testing was completed earlier this year.
The community, located 550 kilometres north of Thunder Bay in the Kenora district, had been serviced by pump houses built 20 years ago but each of those had been under advisories since 2004.
“There were 11 of them throughout the community but all of them had long-term drinking water advisories on them because none of the systems were functioning in a way that was able to make the water clean,” said Indigenous Services Minister Jane Philpott, who travelled to the community for the opening.
“What they did by building this beautiful new station was having one really state-of-the-art facility, making sure that water is pumped out to all the appropriate places and serves all the public facilities there.”
Federal funding for the nearly $12 million project was first announced in July 2016, a dozen years after the advisories had been first implemented.
Philpott said an entire generation of the community has grown up without clean drinking water.
“People understand that clean drinking water is one of the most basic necessities of life. You can’t live without water and you certainly don’t want have to always boil your water or treat it somehow,” Philpott said.
“To see these kids who have been a big part of it, writing letters to the prime minister and asking us to do this, they were the kids that we were really celebrating.”
The federal government has committed to removing all long-term drinking water advisories in First Nations communities across the country by 2021. There are 81 long-term drinking water advisories on-reserve in Canada currently with 17 of those in Nishnawbe Aski Nation territory.
“Every single one of those has a plan in place,” Philpott said. “We’re working very actively with every one of those communities to make sure the work gets done, the design is done and construction. Many of them are well underway and we’re on track to make sure we hit that target.”
New water treatment plants are planned for Marten Falls and Lac Seul, which both have estimated completion dates of 2019, as well as Eabamatoong First Nation, which has a 2020 target. Others, such as Sachigo Lake and Sandy Lake, are in the feasibility stage.
“We’re addressing communities one by one. They each have unique situations in terms of the geography and the layout of the community, what the issues are in terms of water quality in those regions,” Philpott said.
