First Nations leaders are asking the federal and provincial governments for financial support to see a private campground in Manitoba expropriated which they suspect contains unmarked graves, according to the Winnipeg Sun.
But the owner of the campground says he believes the remains of children can be respected and memorialized without shutting his business down.
The meeting was an opportunity to discuss the “urgent matter” of protecting suspected burial sites of MKO citizens in areas on or near sites of former residential schools, MKO said in a release.
Turtle Crossing Campground owner Mark Kovatch said on Monday (Oct. 16) he has seen sufficient evidence to conclude that residential school students were buried on his property up until 1912, but he does not want to see the campground land expropriated and instead said he has been working to memorialize those children and protect the areas where the graveyard once stood.
“If the whole campground was shut down it would be a bad thing for the city of Brandon,” Kovatch said.
