Rain for the crops
By Leela Sharon Aheer Chestermere-Strathmore MLA
Hello Chestermere-Strathmore readers! With seeding pretty well done it is good to see some rain to help bring the crops out of the ground. I had a look at the 14-day forecast and it is predicting rain every seven days or so. Here’s hoping it falls at night and not during our barbecues. Unfortunately, it’s also bringing out a crop of mosquitos as I am sure most of you have noticed.
This has been a week that has impacted me very deeply on many levels. The world shifts and changes faster than any of us can keep up with these days, and I am always truly humbled by the incredible Albertans that I meet who care so much about their province, their neighbours, and truly inspire me each and every day to be better. June is Pride Month, and we stand beside our LGBTQ2S+ families, friends and community members so they are safe to love, identify and live their best lives inclusively in warm, welcoming and safe communities. We have a responsibility to speak out against bigotry and discrimination, and I want to thank our wonderful communities throughout Chestermere-Strathmore for your advocacy, and for creating wonderful spaces for families to live and love freely.
Relationships are about trust and are about understanding the unique things about each others’ cultures, faiths, backgrounds and lived experiences. When we look at how we want to combat racism, it is difficult to know where to start, especially when we see what transpired south of the border this past week. Racism is a violation of human rights, and again as a functioning society it is our collective responsibility to respond to these acts that devalue others by loudly stating that we will not stand for this type of behaviour in our society ever. If we truly seek safe and caring communities, we must include everyone. No one can be left behind. What we can do now is heal together, learning from tragic events like the George Floyd incident, knowing that no one should die such a terrible death, and knowing we can do much better. I want to thank everyone who has reached out, spoken out and looked at how we can make sure that our society reflects the people in it. Kaycee Madu, Minister of Municipal Affairs, said in an interview with Rick Bell in the Calgary Sun on June 5: “I want people to know that racism is real. To those individuals who try to deny the prevalence of racism, I have my own scar on my back to show for it. We need to make sure that our world is one where we all feel safe and where we can all see ourselves reflected in the communities that we live in.”
Finally, this week we honoured the first anniversary of the release of the final report on Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls that calls for action to combat the staggering rates of violence against Indigenous women and girls. Thank you to our sisters who shared their stories, and the knowledge keepers who gathered information and stories for two years. We honour this work and we have begun a joint working group to address the calls to justice contained in the final report. Thank you to Rick Wilson, Minister of Indigenous Affairs, for working towards ending this violence.
(Leela Sharon Aheer is the MLA Elect for Chestermere-Strathmore, Minister of Status of Women and Minister of Culture and Multiculturalism)