First Nation celebrates freshwater conquest more than 40 years in the making: 'I'm really happy'

After four decades, a First Nation community in Canada is finally able to fully access clean water.

St'uxwtéws (Bonaparte First Nation) has been dealing with recurring boil water advisories and water from the tap that one member, Dean Morgan, described to the CBC as "like a real slime." But over the past four years, they have gotten over $14 million in funding from Indigenous Services Canada to put in new water treatment plants.

The facilities have been built to accommodate community growth and remove heavy metals, along with strong smells and tastes, from the water supply.

Madjid Mohseni, a professor of chemical and biological engineering at the University of British Columbia, said that while there is still a lot of progress that needs to be made to ensure First Nations communities across the country have clean, safe drinking water, celebrating the success is important to raise awareness.

"By being able to address the needs of our First Nations communities and their water, we are actually going to come up with innovative solutions or innovative approaches that can not only solve the problems in Canada but also can work globally as well," he said.

Clean drinking water has been declared a human right by the United Nations and is one of the 17 goals under its 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda. Developed in 2015, the SDA includes access to clean water and sanitation, affordable and clean energy, and climate action.

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As important as it is for humans' survival and well-being, maintaining clean water sources through treatment facilities has an environmental benefit as well. Water treatment plants remove pollutants and other potentially harmful substances from the overall water supply, preventing them from working their way back into rivers, lakes, and the ocean.

The St'uxwtéws community's work is a great example of what advocacy can achieve when people work together to encourage local and federal governments to act.

Similar to the success in Canada, earlier this year, President Biden issued a new rule through the Environmental Protection Agency that cities need to replace their lead pipes within 10 years.

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Deanna Branch, a mother and lead-poisoning awareness activist from Milwaukee, where the new rule was announced, told CBS, "When I first started advocating, there was a 50-year plan that went down to a 40-year plan. Now there is a nine-year plan to remove all the lead pipes in Milwaukee. I should be alive to see the lead pipes being removed out of Milwaukee and that gives me hope for other places as well."

In the St'uxwtéws, the elders are rejoicing over new clean water facilities.

"I'm really happy … because I can drink the water. I can bathe in it," Morgan told the CBC.