Dear Steven Guilbeault (federal minister of environment and climate change),
I am Luka, a 14-year-old streamkeeper that helps in protecting Stoney Creek.
Stoney Creek is a creek near Vancouver, in Burnaby and Coquitlam, and has a very successful urban chum and coho salmon run as well as being home to the endangered nooksack dace, pink salmon, steelhead, cutthroat and rainbow trout, western brook lamprey and crayfish. Even though our creek and its wildlife is an important creek, our creek is polluted by sewage averaging the E. coli levels at 5,000 mpn/100 ml, construction dumps including concrete brining the PH of the creek to 11 ph killing off hundreds of fish and other dumps which also caused damage to the environment.
For more information you could see the video by Simon Fraser University here. Over spring break, I spent a lot of time going to the creek to see the wildlife. Unfortunately, the creek is often too polluted to see the wildlife in the creek.
I thought that after years of work that the steps would be taken to stop the pollution of Stoney Creek, but the pollution of Stoney Creek and the destruction of the salmon, nooksack and other wildlife's habitat continue. I ask for your help in getting the cities of Coquitlam and Burnaby, as well as B.C., to finally stop the destruction of Stoney Creek and its wildlife.
I invite you to visit Stoney Creek on April 22 (Earth Day) so we can, together, bring attention to the work that needs to be done on Stoney Creek. Best regards, - Luka Kovačić
