Outaouais

WQSB schools combatting verbal aggression in class

Local Journalism Initiative / / / , , , ,

by Zenith Wolfe

Local Journalism Initiative

As Canadian school teachers and staff continue to grapple with verbal aggression in classrooms, several Outaouais school boards are taking action with anti-violence weeks and regional committees against classroom incivility.

In 2024, the Fédération du personnel de soutien scolaire (FPSS-CSQ) surveyed over 5,000 Quebec school staff to determine how often they were abused during the 2023-2024 school year. A third of respondents reported at least one instance of physical abuse, while around 40 per cent were subject to verbal or other non-physical abuse, such as shouting, offensive comments or intimidation. Ninety per cent of staff who reported abuse that year said students are the main instigators, the survey says.

George Singfield is director-general of the Western Quebec School Board (WQSB), which oversees 31 schools, adult education centres and vocational training centres across the province. He hesitates to speak about an increase in verbal aggression at his schools, but says he’s witnessed an increase in verbal aggression from all Canadians over his 38-year education career.

“In 1985 when I started as a teacher, did I see students who were verbally aggressive? Absolutely,” he says. “Where I see the difference is that it’s become more of a thing in our society.”

“Schools are a microcosm of society,” he continues. “The message we don’t want to give is that it’s okay to be verbally aggressive.” 

According to a 2024 Brock University study that compared student behaviours from fall 2019 and 2022, school children are also becoming less civil in classrooms. Forty-two per cent of surveyed teachers said they witnessed students interrupting each other, texting during class, arriving late or packing up early. This is up from six per cent before the pandemic. 

The WQSB director general says their schools are taking proactive measures to prevent aggression, such as ongoing anti-bullying campaigns. Singfield also met with Quebec Ministry of Education representatives in mid-February to discuss their upcoming anti-violence week, taking place from March 17 to 21. Singfield could not provide specifics on the event because it’s still under discussion.

WQSB chairwoman Joanne Labadie says these kinds of events help remind parents about their schools’ strict anti-violence policies.

“I think that if you look at our data, our schools are very safe and there are very few incidents. But it’s always something we should keep on our radar to address when they come up,” Labadie says.

Employee assistance and counselling resources are also available to all WQSB staff members who are verbally abused, Singfield says.

“It’s part of their job to deal with all kinds of situations, but staff shouldn’t deal with it alone. The last thing we want to do is leave a staff member feeling isolated,” he says.

The Centre de services scolaire des Draveurs (CSSD) founded a regional committee in fall 2024 to combat uncivil classroom behaviour. Though the WQSB is not a part of this committee, Singfield says he’s informally discussed it with CSSD representatives.

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Black and white photo of person standing in front of a window with their back to the camera

‘Is there anything we can do?’

Local Journalism Initiative / / / , ,

by Trevor Greenway

Local Journalism Initiative

Content warning: This article discusses suicide. If you’re struggling, help is available. You are not alone. Please reach out to a trusted friend, family member, or a professional. In Canada, you can call or text 988 for free, confidential support 24/7.

Declan Thomas was a friend, a brother and a chef. Patrick Thompson was a talented artist, an adoring uncle and an inspiration to young artists in the north. Jay Dubois was a village contractor and a loving father. 

These three young men – and many others who we didn’t mention out of respect for their families, were all part of the fabric that made the Gatineau Hills so special. They had loving mothers and fathers, friends, siblings, nieces and nephews, wives, kids and proud grandparents who loved them. They were young souls with futures ahead of them.

But for these three young men – and thousands more across Quebec – those dreams were never realized, those plans were never fulfilled and their family members were left devastated by the news that their loved ones had taken their own lives. All of these men died by suicide in the last five years. 

“With Declan, it was just out of the blue,” said Declan Thomas’ brother, Owain, speaking about the loss of his brother close to two years after his death in 2022. “He was quite secretive, and he didn’t share much. 

Nobody really knew the whole story of anything. If you knew Declan, you knew there’s a lot going on underneath.”

Owain has spent the last 24 months recovering and rebuilding his life from insurmountable grief that he said is impossible to describe. Just two months after his brother died by suicide, Owain’s wife Elyse Cragg took her own life. The father of a three-year-old not only mourned the death of his brother but also his wife – the mother of his only child.

“It was two suicides in two and a half months,” Owain told the Low Down. He’s stoic and collected after spending months in therapy and counselling. He said he wants to talk about suicide rates and the mental toll it takes on families left to pick up the pieces. “I was with my little boy, who was three and potty training, and I was alone in a town [in Brossard, QC] where I didn’t know anybody, and I had no family or friends around. It was rough. I tried to help Declan, and I tried to help her, too.” 

That “help” not only came in the form of counselling and therapy but also listening and trying to understand the issues Owain’s brother and wife were struggling with. Owain said what was hard to bear was his brother’s unwillingness to speak about his problems; that Declan did not feel strong enough to confront his struggles with drugs and alcohol, his loneliness or his growing self-shame. Owain said he did everything he could to help and still lost two loved ones to suicide. 

“I knew that Declan needed help and I tried to help him, but it just didn’t get addressed,” explained Owain. “A lot of people tried. And a lot of his girlfriends – most of his girlfriends – reached out to me and said, ‘Is there anything we can do?’”

Owain has since moved to Pincourt, QC, where he is “rebuilding” his life with his new partner Tiffany and her three young daughters. 

Men three times more likely to take their own lives 

A new suicide report by the Institut national de santé publique du Québec (INSPQ) states that men are three times more likely to take their own lives than women.

According to the report, these three local young men – Thomas, Thompson, and Dubois – are among the 4,924 Quebecers who have taken their own lives since 2017 and are among the 345 Outaouais residents who ended their own lives in that same period. The report also shows that suicides in Quebec have remained fairly consistent over the past several years, with 1,051 suicides recorded in 2020; 1,031 in 2021 and 1,102 in 2022. 

When looking at gender, the report shows that men are three times more likely to take their own lives than their female counterparts, with the adjusted suicide rate for women at 5.5 per 100,000 people compared to 18.6 per 100,000 for men. 

In the Outaouais, the suicide rate is above the provincial average. According to the report, the suicide rate in Quebec hovers at around 10 people per 100,000, while the Outaouais is around 13.9 per 100,000. 

The highest suicide rates in the province are in Nunavik, where a staggering 173 people per 100,000 residents take their own lives. 

While the stats are clear, the reasons behind why so many young men are taking their own lives are more complicated. The Low Down reached out to more than a dozen local, Quebec-based and Canadian psychologists and psychiatrists – none of them were willing to comment on the report or the growing crisis. 

However, research shows that “men account for almost three out of four ‘deaths of despair,’ from overdose or suicide,” according to American writer and social scientist Richard Reeves, who explores this in his 2022 book, ‘Of Boys and Men’. Reeves’ research has found the likelihood of men taking their own lives significantly higher than that of their female counterparts. 

“Opioid deaths are at about 70 per cent plus male; men are about four times more likely to commit suicide than women are,” Reeves told New York Times journalist Ezra Klein in 2023. “It’s risen by about 25 per cent as well over the last 10 years or so.” In his book, Reeves argues that the U.S. education system is placing boys at a disadvantage and explores why boys raised in poverty are less likely to escape than girls and why so many young men are seeking controversial figures like self-proclaimed misogynist Andrew Tate and Jordan Peterson, a well-known, Canadian psychologist who was forced to undergo social media sensitivity training after posting transphobic, racist and misogynistic tweets. Reeves said on Klein’s podcast that more and more young men are wondering where they fit in the world: “I think that sense of being needed is hugely important,” he said. 

A recent study by research fellow and suicide prevention expert Fiona Shand published in the British Medical Journal looked at the words that men used to describe themselves before suicide. The two words they most commonly used were “useless” and “worthless.”

An Angus Reid survey in 2021 found that 63 per cent of 18- to 34-year-old Canadian men experienced considerable loneliness and isolation, compared to 53 per cent of their female counterparts. These results are similar to a recent U.S. study, in which one in three young men said they always or often felt lonely, and more than a quarter said they had no close friends; again, higher than rates among young women.

These stats are not surprising to Wakefield resident Alexandre Bon-Miller, a men’s life coach, mentor and executive director at Boys to Men Canada, which helps young men “navigate towards self-awareness, growth and masculinity,” according to its website. His organizations hosts retreats for men aged 13-35 who are in “crisis or transition.” 

He was clear that he is not a psychologist but has been working with young men for over two decades. He said that while most suicide cases are unique and come with a “collection of influences and variables and aspects,” a lot of young men are feeling lost these days.

“I think one main thing is a lack of purpose, a lack of sense of direction and purpose and meaning,” Bon-Miller told the Low Down. “More than ever, young people are coming into a zeitgeist where they don’t trust authority; they don’t trust our institutions. So, there’s a cynicism and a mistrust and a nihilism that is only exacerbated through the culture war. This is where you get these young men looking around on the internet, [and] they find guys like Andrew Tate, and they follow down those paths.” 

A struggle to help those struggling

Part of the struggle for Bon Miller – and others – has been engaging young men to address their issues. It was a similar problem for Owain in getting his brother Declan to seek help, and it seems to be a constant struggle for families who may be aware of a loved one’s struggles but have no idea how to help them. This struggle is well documented, with the Angus Reid study showing that women are almost three times more likely to seek help through social services.

It’s a problem Danielle Lanyi said she is all too familiar with. The executive director at Connexions Resource Centre in Wakefield said that there are plenty of resources available to help those in crisis, but most people don’t know about them. Another huge barrier is that most of the help is through institutions, and they often come with long wait times for crisis intervention.  But she praised the CISSS’s Aire Ouvert program, which translates to “open space,” and that’s what it is. The service connects youth and parents with a network of specialists: psychologists, therapists, sexologists, nurses and social workers, who will meet either virtually or in-person to discuss anything from mental health and sexuality to drug addiction – and everything in between. The service is by appointment only and is available in both French and English. 

“I think they have done a good job so far,” said Lanyi. “They have numerous committees and focus groups with youth and parents, and they are also working with community organizations.” 

Lanyi referenced a long list of resources for those struggling with their mental health but added that Quebec is lacking in follow-up treatment after a patient goes through a crisis. 

“I find that the aftermath is when things start to really sink in,” said Lanyi, referring to either someone who has attempted suicide, someone struggling with a crisis or a family member dealing with the grief of losing a loved one to suicide. “People start processing and, you know, start to ask, ‘What are the next steps?’ And they’re just kind of left on their own.” 

Lanyi urges residents to use the Santé Québec 811 hotline if they are in a crisis, as the service isn’t solely a telephone support system. Lanyi said Quebec has social workers and nurses on the ground in the region. 

“If it’s a crisis, and if it’s a suicide crisis especially, I know that 811 also responds,” she said about the bilingual service. 

Maison le Ricochet in Masham is another local organization that helps transition those going through a mental crisis back into society. The organization has 21 beds throughout the municipality and offers everything from counselling and mental health support to rehabilitation programs that allow patients to work in the wood shop or their electronic recycling plant. The home has been in operation since 1990.

People like Owain, the Dubois family and the Thompsons know nothing will ever bring their brothers and sons back, nor will the pain of losing a loved one to suicide ever go away, but they are all candid about talking about suicide and mental health in the hopes that it could save someone going down that path. 

If you or someone you know is struggling with mental health, help is available. See our list of mental health resources to the right. And if you need immediate help, dial 911. 

If you need help…

Mental Health Resources:

  • Suicide.ca – Bilingual
    •  Prevention line: 1-866-APPELLE (277-3553)
  • Canada Suicide Prevention Service – Bilingual
    •  24-Hour Crisis Line: call/text: 988
  • Info-santé – Bilingual
    • 24-Hour Crisis Line: 811, press option #2 to speak with a social worker
  • Distress Centre of Ottawa and Region – Bilingual
    •  24/7 Crisis Line: 613-238-3311
  • Tel-Aide Outaouais – French Only
    • 24 hour helpline:: 819-775-3223 or toll-free: at 1-800-567-9699
  • L’Apogée
    • Centre for family and friends of a person living with a mental health disorder: 819-771-6488
    • www.lapogee.ca
  • Aire ouverte
  • Maison le Ricochet
    • Rehabilitation and social and professional reintegration services to individuals dealing with mental health issues of varying intensity. The organization offers accommodation services, workshops, and work programs with support and supervision 24/7. 
    • Phone: 819-456-4230
    • Email: maisonlericochet@qc.aira.com. 
    • Website: www.maisonlericochet.com, 
    • 9 Ch. de la Beurrerie, Masham.

Grieving Resources: 

  • Bereaved Families Ottawa: bfo-ottawa.org (English)
  • ROCSMO (Regroupement des organismes communautaires en santé mentale): santementaleoutaouais.ca (Bilingual)
  • Maison Alonzo-Wright: www.maisonalonzowright.com/nos-services 
  • Écoute Agricole: www.ecouteagricole.com/en
  • Ami-Québec: amiquebec.org
  • Entraide-Deuil-Outaouais: 819-770-4814 (French only)
  • Intersection (Deuil post-suicide): 819-568-4555 (French only)

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Heritage College says Bill 96 unfair to students

Local Journalism Initiative / / / , , , ,

By Trevor Greenway

editor@lowdownonline.com

Some Heritage College students will attend school on a weekend this year to prepare for Quebec’s French-language exit exam, a new requirement for those who don’t hold an English eligibility certificate. 

Heritage College’s academic dean Lisa Peldjak said the school is working on a mock exam for this October, where all non-certificate holders show up on a Saturday to measure themselves against the provincial standard in French. Those who struggle in the exam will have time to improve before the actual exam next spring. 

“This is going to be a real snapshot of what the French exit exam will look like,” said Peldjak. “They’re going to be here all day. It’s mandatory for the students to attend. And it’ll be worth grades. But they’re going to grade it like the French exit [exam] to give the students a taste of what the exam will be like.”

But Heritage’s director-general Terry Kharyati said he has no idea how many of these students will attend this mock exam in October, as the prospect of non-French speakers taking the same exit exam as their francophone counterparts has been a major deterrent for prospective students. 

“All students have the opportunity to feel welcome, first, and the accessibility to what is a great education,” said Kharyati. “But for some who’ve never taken French, it’s ominous. We see that already from students who are coming here from Ontario or who are from the Glebe High School [Ottawa]. If they come here, they’re considered non-anglo because they don’t have their English eligibility rights.”

“We’re recruiting students for basketball. We have students coming over from Ridgemont High School [in Ottawa],” added Kharyati. “But it’s getting more difficult to recruit from Ottawa schools.”

Part of the problem with the English eligibility certificates is that the Ministry of Education will only give them out to students who are currently enrolled in English high schools in Quebec. Those who have already graduated and request a certificate after they’ve graduated are being denied. Those who attend CEGEPs without the certificate will be required to write the province’s three-hour French exit exam, whereas those who hold the certificate will take an English exam.

The new CEGEP rules are part of the CAQ government’s implementation of Bill 96 – the province’s overhaul of the Charter of the French Language, which requires all non-English certificate holders to take the French exam. Bill 96 became Law 14 after it was passed in 2022, affecting how the charter applies to English CEGEPs in the province. Students who do hold English certificates will also have to take three additional French-language courses or three core courses in French, creating a two-tiered system for students. 

Peldjak explained that the college is using incoming high school grades in French, as well as a college assessment, to determine whether or not a student is placed in the advanced French stream. The advanced stream will allow students to take two French as a second language (FSL) courses, two complementary courses in French and one program-specific course in French. Non-advanced stream students will take a total of five FSL courses within their two years at the college. 

“Depending on the student and their level of French, they’re not all coming in being treated fairly or equally,” she said. 

Peldjak noted that students who are required to take the five FSL courses don’t have the option of taking complementary courses, which give them a “highlight into other interests that they might have.” These students, according to Peldjak, miss out on the entirety of other courses the college has to offer. 

The college won’t know how much of a deterrent these new rules will be on the student population until final enrollment numbers are reported in mid-September.

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CISSSO forms new local healthcare committee

Local Journalism Initiative / / / , ,

Sophie Kuijper Dickson, LJI Reporter

Outaouais’ healthcare provider (CISSSO) has formalized a collaboration agreement with a group of healthcare workers and community partners in the Pontiac to ensure greater local input on matters that affect residents of the region and improve accessibility, continuity and quality of services across the territory.
The group, which CISSSO refers to as a territorial committee, consists of 22 members, including CISSSO’s Pontiac director Nicole Boucher-Larivière.
Available members met at the CLSC in Shawville on Thursday morning to sign the final mandate agreement.
“The idea is that people [on this committee] will have responsibility to make sure we answer to the community and stay accountable to the population,” Boucher-Larivière said, noting the group has been meeting for about a year to determine its mandate.
She explained the committee will be critical in identifying healthcare priorities for the region, brainstorming strategies for developing those priorities, and sharing input on how limited resources should be allocated.
“There have been multiple evolutions of health and social services law so now we’re going back towards proximity,” Boucher-Larivière noted. “It took a certain time but this is the first step we’re taking towards trying to bring that back.”
The Pontiac region is the first in the Outaouais to sign such an agreement with the CISSS de l’Outaouais since services were centralized in 2015.
Josey Bouchard, founding member of local healthcare advocacy group Pontiac Voice, is one of the members of the new territorial committee.
“It’s basically consulting and sharing a little bit of what’s happening here, and if things aren’t working well, to advise on what they can do to try and make it better,” Boucher said, describing what she understands her role on the committee to be.
“I think it’s nice that at least they have our opinion of what’s happening. And hopefully it helps put a little more pressure on whoever is making the decisions.”
But, Bouchard said, she does not expect the collection of community leaders will have any real decision making power.
“As far as power, that I know of, we have none. It’s more of a consulting role.”
“We’re sort of a moral support – it sort of gives [Nicole] a bit more credit as to what she’s bringing forth to the higher ups.”

The committee’s other 21 members are CISSSO board of directors member Rémi Bertrand, Dr. Serge Boucher, Dr. John Wooton, MRC Pontiac warden Jane Toller, MRC Pontiac director general Kim Lesage, Municipality of Pontiac mayor Roger Larose, Pontiac user committee president Jennifer Larose, healthcare advocate Josey Bouchard, Chamber of Commerce president Sébastien Bonnerot, SADC general director Rhonda Perry, seniors’ representative Richard Gratton, Dr. Isabelle Gagnon, Lisa Falasconi from the English school board, Denis Rossignol from the French school service centre, pharmacist Marc Aufranc, Michel Vallières from the Table de développement social du Pontiac, Shelley Heaphy from the Connexions Resource Centre, Bouffe Pontiac director Kim Laroche, Sara-Lynn McCann from Quyon’s Maison de la famille, Karim El Kerch from Carrefour jeunesse-emploi du Pontiac, and Joanne Dubois from CISSSO.
The group plans to meet four times a year.

CISSSO forms new local healthcare committee Read More »

CISSSO plans could see summer closure of OR

Local Journalism Initiative / / / , ,

Sophie Kuijper Dickson, LJI Reporter

Outaouais’s healthcare network, the Centre intégré de santé et de services sociaux de l’Outaouais (CISSSO), has prepared contingency plans to deal with anticipated staffing shortages over the summer that may, in the worst case scenario, see the region’s rural operating rooms shut down, with services moved to Hull and Gatineau hospitals, Le Droit reported last week.
The contingency plans, a copy of which was obtained by Le Droit but which has not yet been seen by THE EQUITY, detail a few different scenarios for the period of June 17 to Sept. 8, to deal with repercussions of greater staffing shortages that may arise when currently employed healthcare workers take their vacations.
These plans map out how CISSSO will reorganize personnel in rural and urban hospitals across its network, which even without the added pressure from summer vacations, is already understaffed.
According to Le Droit, one series of plans addresses various scenarios of shortages in the health network’s imaging sector, and the other series of plans deals with shortages in the network’s operating services.
In the worst case scenario, the Gatineau hospital would offer only limited emergency services, as well as mental health services and long-term care beds, and its entire radiology department could close completely, forcing the relocation of essential services including childbirth, intensive care and pediatrics, to the Hull hospital.
Also in this worst case scenario, the Hull hospital alone would take on the bulk of operations for the 400,000 people in the Outaouais, with operating rooms in Pontiac, Maniwaki and Papineau hospitals shutting down so that staff could be relocated to work in the operating room in the Hull Hospital.
THE EQUITY requested an interview with CISSSO president and CEO Marc Bilodeau on Thursday last week, and has been scheduled to speak with him this Wednesday.
Pontiac officials speak out
Last week provincial and federal elected officials for the Pontiac added their voices to the growing cries for immediate assistance in the Outaouais.
Pontiac MP Sophie Chatel wrote a letter to Quebec’s Minister of Health Christian Dubé and to Minister of Culture and Communication, Mathieu Lacombe, expressing her concerns surrounding the state of health care in the region.
“It is imperative that the Quebec government take urgent measures to prevent a breakdown in healthcare services in our region,” Chatel wrote, in French. “Although health comes under provincial jurisdiction, I would nevertheless like to express the urgency of the situation in the Outaouais.”
Her letter went on to cite several statistics that highlight the urgency of resolving the healthcare staffing shortage across the Outaouais region.
One set of statistics showed that in 2021, lung cancer patients in the region had the lowest survival rate in the province, in large part due to delays in requests for CT scans. She said the situation worsened when magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) was discontinued at the Gatineau hospital due to a shortage of technologists.
Chatel pointed to the region’s proximity to Ontario as the leading cause of the staffing shortage, and said while the bonuses offered by the Quebec government to staff in Hull and Gatineau hospitals is appreciated, this initiative needs to be extended to staff in rural hospitals.
“This measure must apply to healthcare staff in hospitals in rural regions of the Outaouais, such as Maniwaki, Buckingham, and Shawville, which are already weakened by the trend towards urbanization and over-specialisation in healthcare in Quebec and Canada,” the letter said.
Pontiac MNA and health critic for the official opposition André Fortin also continued to push for immediate solutions to address the growing crisis in the Outaouais.
“This is not a contingency plan. This is an announced catastrophe. What is the premier going to do about this?” Fortin asked in a question directed to Premier François Legault on May 22, regarding CISSSO’s contingency plans.
Minister of Health Christian Dubé responded to the question, explaining that the ministry asks every healthcare network across the province to come up with contingency plans going into the summer for best and worst-case scenarios.
Minister Dubé said his government is aware of the challenges posed by the competition with Ontario, and will do what it can to improve the situation, without providing specific details as to what immediate measures it would take.
Also last week, Fortin requested the province’s health and social services commission visit the Outaouais so they can see for themselves the urgency with which immediate and greater support from the province is needed.

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Citizen scientists needed to help save endangered turtles

Local Journalism Initiative / / / , ,

Glen Hartle, LJI Reporter

Why did the turtle cross the road? Because it had to. And that’s a problem.
Road mortality isn’t just an issue for the Sûreté du Québec and the Société de l’assurance automobile du Québec. It is also an issue for a raft of organizations representing Mother Nature and they have mobilized in support of their mandate.
An Outaouais environmental organization, the Conseil régional de l’environnement et du développement durable de l’Outaouais (CREDDO), has stepped up and undertaken a four-year project working to mitigate road mortality amongst the turtle populations of the region.
The initiative hopes to protect all turtles, but of particular concern are two species currently on the provincial, national and global endangered species lists: the Blanding’s turtle and the wood turtle. A third species, the northern map turtle, is additionally targeted by the project due to regional and national concerns.
The overall objective of the project, as articulated at its official launch in Sept. 2023, is to reduce the extent of road mortality of turtles in the Outaouais region by prioritizing actions targeting Blanding’s, wood and northern map turtle populations.
More specifically, the goal is to confirm the hotspots of turtle road mortality suggested by available mortality data.
Cénédra Poulin, the activity lead for CREDDO, indicates that while the project officially launched in the summer of 2023, the first phase is about to get under way.
“I think it’s going well so far. We had all the subsidies we asked for and we have a lot of volunteers interested in helping,” Poulin said.
During this initial phase, forecast to last from the middle of May to the middle of July, the project aims to confirm certain road mortality hotspots in the Outaouais through volunteer citizen mortality monitoring in several sectors of the region.
In the Pontiac, the initiative will be specifically focused on busy roadways in the municipalities of Bristol, Clarendon, and Shawville.
“We are searching for people that could spend a few hours per week between mid-May and mid-July, to survey always the same part of a road on a turtle watch,” Poulin said.
Areas of high mortality risk will also be identified, including locations where live turtles are spotted near roads.
“The MRC has a direct role in turtle protection,” said Kari Richardson, MRC Pontiac’s environmental coordinator and its representative for the project. She encouraged residents to report turtle sightings on the Nature Conservancy of Canada portal (https://carapace.ca).
“Once we know exactly where the hot spots are across the Pontiac, we can target awareness efforts, signage and perhaps even fencing, if it is required.”
Subsequent phases of the project will aim to implement measures to reduce road mortality at sites identified as hotspots during the first phase. These mitigation measures will include signage, fencing and wildlife crossings.
Partnering with CREDDO are the Outaouais’ four MRCs (Collines-de-l’Outaouais, Papineau, Pontiac and Vallée-de-la-Gatineau), la Fondation de la Faune du Québec, Nature Conservancy Canada, the National Capital Commission, Kitigan Zibi Anishinabeg, the provincial and federal ministries of environment, and le Groupe de rétablissement des tortues du Québec.
From local to global
Locally, the conversation around conservation is ongoing, and turtles have been on the radar before. Regional art association artPontiac hosted a special “Call of the Turtle” exhibit in 2022 drawing attention to their plight and invited several experts from various organizations, including the Nature Conservancy of Canada and the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society (CPAWS), to speak at the grand opening.
Provincially, Quebec’s environment ministry indicates that the Blanding’s turtle is considered threatened, meaning that it could disappear in short order. The wood turtle and northern map turtle are considered vulnerable, meaning that survival is considered precarious in the long-term.
At the national level, the Committee on the Status on Endangered Wildlife in Canada (COSEWIC) lists the Blanding’s turtle as endangered, meaning it is facing imminent extirpation (regional extinction) or global extinction. The wood turtle is listed as threatened, meaning that it is likely to become endangered if nothing is done to reverse the factors leading to its extirpation or extinction. The northern map turtle is listed as being of special concern, meaning that it is particularly sensitive to human activities or natural events.
At the global level, the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s Red List (IUCN Red List) lists both the Blanding’s turtle and the wood turtle as endangered. This list of threatened species has evolved to become the world’s most comprehensive information source on the global extinction risk status of animal, fungus and plant species and is a critical indicator of the health of the world’s biodiversity. It is not an honour to appear on the list, rather, it is a call for action.
No matter how you read the above categorizations and classifications, the turtles are in danger, and CREDDO is hoping to change that reality by working with various stakeholders on environmental issues in mounting this conservation effort.
If you would like to be a part of the turtle project, contact cenedra.poulin@creddo.ca or k.richardson@mrcpontiac.qc.ca. Information and social media links can be found at: https://creddo.ca.

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