DAVID HALEY, LENNOX ISLAND DEVELOPMENT COPORATION PROPERTY MANAGER, LENNOX ISLAND, PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND, CANADA:
We’re having constant wash-outs. We’re having constant basement flooded because of the water rise. Our roads are being threatened because of erosion. And they say there’s no climate change?

When I first came to live here, we had children out playing baseball in the front yard. They can’t do that anymore. That land is gone.

We’re losing, constantly losing at least three feet a year. And that’s the end result.



DR. TONY CHARLES, DIRECTOR, SCHOOL OF THE ENIVIRONMENT, ST. MARY’S UNIVERSITY, HALIFAX, NOVA SCOTIA, CANADA:
Well Lennox Island is one of the aboriginal communities in Canada—a very dynamic community. [There are] very important issues that they’re facing having to do with climate change. One is increasing sea level: That increases the rate of erosion along the coast. They’re facing that erosion aspect that’s made even worse by sea level rise and also the increasing rate of storm surges.


GILBERT SARK, MI’KMAQ FIRST NATION ELDER, LENNOX ISLAND, PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND, CANADA:
I lived here basically all my life. I’ve seen a lot of changes growing up. I’m 36 now and looking back I was about 8 or 9 when all these areas were a lot bigger.

Over by our church there used by a church where we played tackle football. That field was further out towards the bay, a good 25, 30 feet further out when I was growing up. Since then, it’s pretty eroded now. And they actually put stone up and they covered over it now. It’s little things you wouldn’t notice right off the hop. But then you start looking at it and it’s like, “Yeah, our little Lennox Island is getting little-er [laughs] smaller!”


ANGUS SARK, MI’KMAQ FIRST NATION, LENNOX ISLAND, PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND, CANADA:
We’ll actually every chance I get, you know, [I’m] trying to retrieve what I loss over the years. And whether it would be just rock or some gravel and or cement slabs kind of thing. I know at the end of the day you end up losing against Mother Nature. But before you know it, it will be just right up to the house at this rate anyway.

If it keeps going the rate it is I can’t imagine being here for the next 30 years. We will have to move the house.



DON JARDINE, CLIMATE RESEARCH LAB, UNIVERSITY OF PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND, CHARLOTTETOWN, PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND, CANDA:
Well, we’ve done some coastal vulnerability studies of Lennox Island. We see what they have at risk there. They have their causeway bridge which connects them to the mainland PEI. The approach roads to that are very low. Some of the are less…just over a meter above sea level.

There’s also their sewage treatment system. There has been storm surges that have actually touched the sides of the lagoon already. There’s also their powwow, or sacred grounds, where they had some flooding there as well.

We first discovered three archaeological sites in Hog Island. The sites that have been identified on the island show the mobility of aboriginal people with artifacts and materials coming from places as far as Northern Labrador, Cape Breton and the Bay of Fundy. And it was clear that all of the sites have been subject to erosion and quite heavy weathering.



DAVID HALEY, LENNOX ISLAND DEVELOPMENT COPORATION PROPERTY MANAGER, LENNOX ISLAND, PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND, CANADA:
It’s not good. It’s not good. When talking to some of the elders they’re fearful because this was their home and their home is being slowly eroded away. And it’s a big fear. But it will always be home. There won’t be much of the home left, but nevertheless it will always be home.