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My Christian name is Edna Denise Douglas,

I am borne of the aristocracy of the Coast Salish, and I was raised by my Elders in Traditional ways within post war colonial oppressive years. Much social change was in my time in my land. I am a witness.

My roots stem directly to the matriarchs and the chiefs of chiefs at the time of culture contact. I was raised as an ambassador in turbulent times. And I have seen many forms of violence and reconciliation in our nation. My teaching is when people fall in action to pick people up by the shoulders to walk on.

I was immersed in Christian education at St Mary’s in Chilliwack where I completed elementary school to grade seven. My high school was completed in Chilliwack where in 1977, I graduated after dropping out for two years and a succession on metropolis boarding homes, mostly with residential school survivors. A long struggle manifested me one Bachelor of Arts in adult education at the University of the Fraser Valley in 1997, for which I crossed the stage and a Bachelor of Arts Sociology major and Geography minor which I still must cross the stage. I am a continuing learner for life with master’s studies in the works once I can share my thesis.

I continued my life in the community where I am a mother of three. A grandmother and a great grandmother.

I was an elected member of Cheam Band Council and was on the Coqualeetzea Board of directors in 1970s/80s. Where I wrote many of the Band council resolutions out of meetings of the people in assembly. I spent many years working for Coqualeetza developing curriculum and researching language and history, and was the Stó:lō Adult Education Coordinator. This is when we first coordinated and assembled the Stó:lō chiefs in unison with information coming to our desks. Which we would copy and collate by hand.

I worked as an original staff member of the Stó:lō tribal council. There, with some of my students, we automated the data of the nation. Needless to say, that got bigger than me. While also on council and working for the tribal council I assembled the fifty-four coast Salish chiefs, and they signed the coast Salish declaration on a drum. That declaration still stands.

During that time, we made public our Stó:lō declarations of independence which I still stand by. I was appointed Stó:lō representative on fishing and other matters by 25 Chiefs in a duly convened forum to address the needs of our twenty-five politicians in relationships and protocols with two tribes upriver and all their chiefs to address specific and then environmental concerns of common concern. Especially the fish. And the Fraser River and it is tributaries. That motion was one of their last. And they have never assembled in the same forum to rescind the title. Which I carry with due diligence.