On the heels of the protests against the biggest mistake Newfoundland Labrador governments have ever made via the Muskrat Falls boondoggle, critics and opponents of Site C launched a new campaign started by Wendy Holm. And I wanted to share the words of my friend Shelley Falk-Ouellette who tells the story of the significance of the yellow stake itself:
“BC Hydro had engineers survey and stake out the new highway that would run along the top of the reservoir, up along a plateau.
When they made a final offer to the landowners to buy their property and were turned down, they spent a few extra million of our tax dollars and realigned the highway to go through every holdout landowners front door.
They pounded a yellow stake a few meters from each one to intimidate and bully the good folks who are still living on the valley.
One of the people opposed to the dam, Bill Horne decided to pound a stake in his front yard in Wells, BC. Wendy Holm saw that post and began the “yellow stake” campaign. This is the result.
People buy a stake for $100.00 and their name and hometown are written on it, it’s then pounded into the ground surrounding the BC Hydro stake.
All proceeds go towards legal costs to fight site c dam. I own half a stake in the Peace valley, the other half is owned by my friend and blogger Laila Yuile. If you would like a stake in the Peace, here’s the link:”
Feeling bittersweet seeing my name up there on that stake with Shelley’s,surrounded by a growing sea of yellow stakes that I would like to see grow as big and as wide as the Peace river itself…. considering Hydro wants the Boons off their land by Christmas. I often wish I had the flexibility to be able to take off up there sometimes and just stay a while, but until that happens a yellow stake will do. My heart is there.
I have a stake in the Peace… and I’m showing it. I hope you do too and have your own stake planted on Ken and Arlenes land, and help keep shining the light on the decision to get this project past the point of no return.
Particularly since your kids,grandkids and great grandchildren will be paying for this thing.
Until 2094…. https://www.biv.com/article/2016/10/taxpayers-be-hook-site-c-dam-until-2094/
Now.. considering the lifespan of the reservoir and the dam itself is about 70 years…the entire thing seems even more redundant than ever.
Westcoast Views with Laila Yuile 
This must be the line in the sand time! Ms. Clark must be forgiven for her grievous error. She is betrothed to her corporate sponsors.
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I will do it…….but I am getting tired of symbolic ribbons, stakes, graffiti, roadside shrines, buttons and placards. They squeak louder than the opposition (so do mice) but they do not roar. The only noise I ever hear loud and strong is FN. The rest of us are lost in the ether and static.
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The tactics B.C. Hydro is using are the same ones they used back in the day, when they first started building dams.
idea for Christmas presents for those who have everything: BUY THEM A STAKE IN THE PEACE RIVER VALLEY.
Now can we get the NDP make a comment or two in support of these farmers and the F.N.
If this gets big enough perhaps the CBC or a PBS station will cover this.
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Evil has within it, the seed of its own destruction.
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[…] via I have a stake in the Peace…do you? — Laila Yuile on people, politics and life in B.C. […]
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Maybe we can help John H. and buy yellow stakes in his name…gotta wake the NDP up..soon!
double D
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JDC – all of the money from the sale of the stakes goes to the First Nations’ legal funds for their court cases against Site C. So you can be sure that your funds will be put to good use and Thank You! 🙂
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I don’t have $100 but I can read, I can talk, and I can vote. The Christy Clark government is disgraceful.
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Where a dam is needed is at the entry to Canada’s political community. Far too much muck is making its way in.
People being forced from their community and/or way of long-established life (see upper/lower BC) because of high pricing, vanity project(s) and/or…whatever, is…un-Canadian.
Canada’s education system is CLEARLY in need of a MAJOR upgrade to bring it into the 21st century. The fact it hasn’t been upgraded yet to do just that, is proof enough of just how badly the upgraded is needed.
Is the movie “They Live” even mandatory for students to watch, study and discuss before sending them out into the real world. If not, it OF COURSE should be.
Until this MAJOR education upgrade happens, we’re all just browsers or owners of a store in a very large Shopping Mall managed by toddlers, or…worse.
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My husband’s ashes are in the Alberta Peace River country–so do I have a stake?
The whole issue of the damned dam reminds me of the hydroQuebec flooding of northern PQ–after all, “there were only Indians up there”
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[…] November 1, 2016 7:47 pm in BC election 2017 // I have a stake in the Peace…do you? […]
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