A slew of offensive and discriminatory comments on the potential renaming of a downtown Winnipeg park are just an example of the hate a committee tasked with making city place names more inclusive sees on a regular basis, one of its members says.
On Wednesday, the City of Winnipeg posted on social media it’s looking for feedback on a request to rename Air Canada Park on the corner of Carlton Street and Portage Avenue.
The post was bombarded with hateful comments before the city limited who could respond to it on Thursday, following inquiries by CBC.
“Name it something that no-one can pronounce like the rest of the re-names,” one poster said.
“Let them have downtown, it’s a hole anyway!” said another.
The renaming request was received through the Welcoming Winnipeg initiative, which was established in 2020 as part of the city’s reconciliation efforts.
Co-chair Reanna McKay said those comments show the racism and hate she and other committee members are exposed to during every other renaming request. That includes the recent renaming of Bishop Grandin Boulevard to Abinojii Mikanah.
“It’s also very harmful for all of the Indigenous people that read those comments sections,” she said.
“I had an elder to tell me that they feel sick to their stomach and they can only read one or two because the rest of them just makes them relive the trauma that we’ve always experienced.”
2 steps forward or 10 steps back
Except for street names, all requests to create or make changes to historical markers or place names go through the Welcoming Winnipeg process, run by the city’s Indigenous relations division.
The initiative’s volunteer committee sifts through the requests and provides recommendations, with city council making the final decision.
About 98 per cent of the feedback submissions Welcoming Winnipeg receives through its online portal are negative, McKay said.
“At times, we’re feeling like we’re taking two steps forward, but really it’s just 10 steps back,” she said. “The large majority of the population are still very discriminatory to this perspective and this way of being.”
McKay said the submission was put forward by the people in charge of a $2.5-million plan to redevelop the park.
That project, first announced in 2022, aims to open the space so it’s able to host large events, particularly focusing on celebrating Indigenous culture.
A summary of the request says the park is named after the company that donated that space to the city, but that it isn’t providing any benefit other naming sponsorships offer. Air Canada also supports renaming the park, it adds.
The renaming “has always been part of their discussions,” McKay said.
“Downtown has always had this negative connotation to it.…That negative and racist commentary is always passed around,” she said.
“The name that it has right now isn’t really representative of the place and the people that occupy it today, which includes obviously a large Indigenous population.… I think it’s really important that they have a space that represents them.”
A City of Winnipeg spokesperson said in an email Thursday they didn’t have any information to share on the renaming process until the Welcoming Winnipeg committee makes a recommendation.
“We believe it’s important to promote these renaming requests as broadly as we can, to give anyone interested in providing their input through the Welcoming Winnipeg process the chance to do so,” the spokesperson said.
The request for the name change didn’t suggest what the park’s future name should be.
It said there’s an opportunity to engage park users and the nearby community to come up with something that reflects Welcoming Winnipeg’s values, honours Indigenous peoples and “supports telling the complete history of Winnipeg.”