For First Nations in Alberta, drought only compounds existing water issues

Like many in Alberta with a severe drought bearing down, Rupert Meneen has water on his mind.

"Our source water is a little creek that runs near our community," says the chief of Tallcree First Nation in northern Alberta, roughly 100 kilometres southeast of High Level.

"The only time we pull water out of that creek is when it's running high and the spring runoff has come down. This year we're worried that there's going to be no spring runoff."

It's a reality faced by many First Nations in Alberta, even without the drought — limited access to safe drinking water due to a variety of factors, including lack of funding, infrastructure or source water protection, while caught in jurisdictional tension between the federal and provincial government.

The situation is one of the legacies of colonialism. Many First Nations signed treaties with the Crown giving up much of their traditional territory in exchange for certain ongoing obligations from the federal government.

However, the government often neglected to ensure reserves had access to clean water, leading to chronic problems in many Indigenous communities. In some cases, surrounding industrial or commercial activities degraded the quality of the water that flowed into their territory.

In 2021, a class-action lawsuit brought against Canada over drinking water advisories was settled for $8 billion. More than 100 First Nations — including several in Alberta — as well as thousands of potential individual claimants from hundreds of First Nations are eligible for compensation due to years of long-term water advisories.

Indigenous Services Canada (ISC), the ministry responsible for delivering on the federal government's obligations to Indigenous peoples, maintains online lists of recent water advisories on First Nations reserves. There is a map showing long-term advisories for public systems funded by the government, and a list of those without government funding, as well a list of short-term advisories.

The only Alberta advisories still active on any of those pages are four short-term ones. This might give the impression that few problems with water supply exist on reserves in Alberta.

However, ISC only funds public water systems with at least five household connections. Because the cost of building pipes to each home can be prohibitive, many communities rely on smaller systems with fewer connections, or individual wells and cisterns. Those are not captured by the federal lists of advisories or other statistics.

"What we know about drinking water advisories is actually just the tip of the iceberg," says Kerry Black, an assistant professor of engineering at the University of Calgary with a focus on water management in Indigenous communities.

"It's actually a much bigger deal."

According to statistics from the First Nations Technical Services Advisory Group (TSAG), there are more than 5,600 cisterns and 3,700 wells on reserves in Alberta.

TSAG plays a key role in water access in First Nations communities in Alberta. The non-profit organization was created in 1998, mandated to take over various technical service roles previously provided to First Nations by the federal government. It operates under the guidance of a steering committee of chiefs from Treaties 6, 7 and 8, including Meneen.