Rally demands action on potential landfill searches

By: Cierra Bettens Posted: 6:44 PM CDT Wednesday, Jun. 14, 2023

Decked out in camouflage clothing and surrounded by a group of Indigenous warriors, Cambria Harris demanded the Manitoba government respond to calls to search Winnipeg landfills for the remains of homicide victims.

Read this article for free:

or

Already have an account? Log in here »

To continue reading, please subscribe:

*Billed as $4.00 plus GST every four weeks. After 24 weeks, price increases to the regular rate of $19.00 plus GST every four weeks. Offer available to new and qualified returning subscribers only. Cancel any time.

*Billed as $19 plus GST every four weeks. Cancel any time.

Read unlimited articles for free today:

or

Already have an account? Log in here »

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 14/06/2023 (861 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

“There are people still hurting out here and there are families still grieving who have no place to go to put flowers down, to visit a memorial site with their loved ones,” Harris told First Nations leaders, family members and supporters who gathered at the provincial legislature Wednesday.

“When we want to go visit our loved ones, we go to the Prairie Green Landfill, a city dump.”

Cambria Harris, daughter of Morgan Harris, speaks to supporters gathered at a rally for provincial funding to search two landfills for the bodies of Mercedes Myron and Morgan Harris and other missing people at the Manitoba Legislature. (John Woods / The Canadian Press)

One of the gathering attendees held a sign saying: “Stop wasting time! The landfill is not a grave!”

Police believe Harris’s mother, Morgan Harris, is one of four Indigenous women killed by the same Winnipeg man in 2022.

City police have said investigators believe the remains of Harris, 39, and Marcedes Myran, 26, were deposited by garbage collection trucks at privately owned Prairie Green, north of the Manitoba capital.

The partial remains of Rebecca Contois, 24, were found at the Brady Road Landfill, south of the city. One missing woman (named Buffalo Woman by elders) has yet to be identified, and police have not stated where they think her remains are located.

Jeremy Skibicki has been charged with four counts of first-degree murder.

Protesters and family supporters want both local landfills searched for remains.

Cambria Harris has spent much of her time at an encampment outside the Brady Road facility. Camp Morgan is named after her mother and was created to pressure the City of Winnipeg to shut down the landfill for a search.

In December, Harris met with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Marc Miller, minister of Crown-Indigenous relations. Miller later met with both the Harris and Myran families on multiple occasions.

Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs Grand Chief Cathy Merrick said the federal government has asked the group to obtain the province’s support before action can be taken.

Ottawa put up $500,000 to conduct a feasibility study on searching the Prairie Green landfill.

The study said such efforts would take from one to three years, cost as much as $184 million, and there was the risk of worker exposure to toxic chemicals and asbestos.

The Winnipeg Police Service, staffers from the Winnipeg mayor’s office, and the RCMP, were among those consulted during the study, Merrick said.

“We had all these people at the table when we were sitting as the feasibility study oversight committee,” the AMC leader said.

Assembly of Manitoba Chiefs Grand Chief Cathy Merrick said the federal government has asked the group to obtain the province’s support before action can be taken. (Ruth Bonneville / Winnipeg Free Press)

“So, I don’t think that we did our work wrong. I think we did the work that was required of us, and we produced a document, and there hasn’t been any response to that document to this day.”

Long Plain First Nation Chief Kyra Wilson, one of several speakers at the Wednesday rally, encouraged all levels of government to refrain from politicizing the matter, and instead, view it as a humanitarian issue.

“These are women that are in a landfill, and we need to be looking for these women for our community members,” Wilson said. “It doesn’t matter if you’re a part of the federal government or the provincial government, you have the mandate to take care of our communities.”

Members of Myran’s family were also at the rally, including grandmother Donna Bartlett.

“I want my girl home,” Bartlett said. “You don’t know how hard it is to have your babies asking you, ‘I want my mommy home.’

“You’ve got to start thinking about us as people, because we are people.”

Premier Heather Stefanson has expressed support for the feasibility study. At the rally, Harris questioned why no action has been taken.

“Back in December, Heather Stefanson had gone on live TV and said that she would be there for my family,” Harris said. “What was the point of that if nothing has been done, nothing has changed?”

cierra.bettens@freepress.mb.ca