Sitansisk
(St Mary’s First Nation)
150 Cliffe Street, Fredericton, NB E3A 0A1
+1 (506) 458-9511 T.F. (888) 445-6644
August 22, 2023, 15h09
stmarysfirstnation.com
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Sitansisk’s Chief and Council remain committed to addressing safety concerns in our community and have acted swiftly and decisively to enable us to resolve them.
This state of local emergency will empower our partners at other levels of government to help in rooting out this problem.
In the immediate future, we will be bringing security gates back into the community, but we are not placing the community under any form of lockdown or curfew.
We, as leaders, remain focused on raising awareness around the risks facing our communities and remain committed to seeing our missing and murdered indigenous women, girls, and 2-spirited individuals returned home.
Many of the troubles we face stem back to intergenerational trauma, historically inadequate mental health treatment, and addictions.
All levels of government, not just ours, should be aware of this which is why we are taking a trauma-informed care approach and are looking to ensure our members who need help can access it, free of stigma, and in as timely a manner as possible.
I urge any member struggling with addiction to reach out to our addictions and mental health team.
Retail operations at our businesses remain intact, for patrons who may worry about a disruption in access to food and fuel.
Our priority with this declaration is restoring a sense of security in our community, a sore point for many years now, with recent tensions growing beyond what internal approaches such as security patrols and gates could handle on their own. This is why we are calling on our allies and partners in the federal and provincial government to help.
Available as a PDF here: 20230822 Sakom Polchies Media Remarks