The community library in Lax Kw’alaams is one of 19 learning centres that have been built for small Indigenous villages through the efforts of a volunteer project inspired by former B.C. lieutenant-governor Steven Point, a one-time chief of the Sto:lo nation, and retired police officer Bob Blacker. Both men are leaders with the Rotary Club.
Without relying on government money, more than 50 B.C. male and female volunteers with the Write to Read Project (W2R) have used trucks, boats and airplanes to distribute more than 70,000 books onto reserves throughout the province, says Blacker, the project manager. Three more libraries will be erected as soon as the pandemic subsides.
Since the Write to Read Project installed the first library on the Tooney reserve at Riske Creek in 2011, Blacker said, it has found donors to provide modular buildings, furniture, shelving and scores of computers — as well as crucial high-speed, fibre-optic internet connections — to Indigenous reserves including Metlakatla, Metchosin, Nooaitch and Gitsegukla.
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