“I think it is time for Indigenous leaders and communities to take a look at how much participation in resource extraction is too much and how to mitigate some of these things and push towards water conservation and other things we know will help to curb forest fires,” said Houle. A hot and dry spring has meant that there has been little precipitation to help firefighters battle the blazes.

Leaders and community members in the Kanien'kehá:ka (Mohawk) of Kanesatake are demanding help in decontaminating a dump site that could affect water quality in one of Quebec's most popular lakes. Mohawk Council of Kanestake Grand Chief Victor Bonspille said he is in contact with Canada and his community's environmental protection office to find a solution to toxic water leaking off a now-closed recycling operation in the community west of Montreal.

Tamara Brass lives at the Key First Nation. She told Yorkton This Week she enrolled in the course because of an interest in how people were accessing their water. On the Key First Nation Brass said about 80 per cent of residences access water through a treatment plant not unlike the one in Yorkton, only on a much smaller scale. The remaining residences have their own source of water. The Yorkton plant tour was one Brass said she found interesting in terms of the level of maintenance and testing employed to ensure water quality, adding it was good to get a look at what happens “behind the scenes” in terms of water quality.