Highway of Tears symposium releases its recommendations

The recent symposium in Prince George, into the deaths and disappearances of young, mostly First Nations women along highway 16, has made some observations and more than thirty recommendations into how to remove the targets of the predator or predators that are traveling that stretch of highway.

From safe houses, to shuttle buses and free travel on Greyhound, the symposiums findings were many and wide ranging. They ask for an increased police presence an intensive educational campaign and a network of watchers to prevent hitch hiking and keep young women safe.

The recommendations were released to the public on the same day that the RCMP officially added two more names to the list of those that have disappeared on the Highway of Tears.

The symposium results were posted on a website created to increase awareness in the disappearances, it's called Highway of Tears, you can learn more about the issue by clicking on the link above.

Mark Hume has written a comprehensive article for the Globe and Mail, which traces the history of the troubling disappearances those confirmed, as well as those suspected but as of yet not listed and what symposium organizers hope will come of their recommendations. It’s reprinted below.

Stopping the pain on the 'highway of tears'
Nine women have been killed or disappeared along one desolate stretch of road in B.C. Now a dozen communities have a plan to stop the anguish

MARK HUME
From Thursday's Globe and Mail

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VANCOUVER — A series of nine killings and disappearances along a beautiful but desolate stretch of road known as the "highway of tears" has led to the production of a remarkable public document.

The citizens from more than a dozen small communities along 724 kilometres of Yellowhead Highway 16 in northern British Columbia have joined forces to demand an end to the killings of young, female and mostly aboriginal hitchhikers.

And they have a plan for accomplishing that goal.

They want safe houses, a fleet of shuttle buses, increased police presence, educational campaigns and a network of "watchers" established along the highway to keep young women safe and prevent hitchhiking.

"These killings and disappearances have to stop," Don Sabo, who organized the report after the recent Highway Of Tears Symposium, said yesterday.

"There is a killer, or killers out there . . . We have to remove the targets - the targets being young female women hitchhikers," Mr. Sabo said as he released a document forged earlier this year in an intense, emotional symposium involving 500 community delegates, including the families of victims.

The report proposes a sweeping action plan involving all levels of government, the RCMP, schools, native bands, the public and even private enterprise.

One recommendation is for Greyhound to order its drivers to stop and give free passage to women hitchhikers they see along the highway.

Another recommendation urges Telus to put emergency telephone booths along the highway at strategic locations, and to expand cellular coverage to fill in communication holes in the wilderness areas.

The highway runs east to west, linking the port city of Prince Rupert with the Interior milling town of Prince George. Along the way it passes through small logging and ranching communities, including Terrace, Smithers, Houston and Burns Lake.

North and south of the Highway 16 connector are many small, isolated native reserves and villages.

Nine women between the ages of 14 and 25 have vanished or been found dead along the highway since 1979.

There are unconfirmed reports many more have gone missing along the route.

"There is much community speculation and debate on the exact number of women that have disappeared along Highway 16 over a longer, 35-year period.

"Many are saying the number of missing women, combined with the number of confirmed murdered women, exceeds 30," the report says.

"There are indeed other missing women, whose families attended the Highway of Tears Symposium to underline the fact that there needs to be acknowledgment and recognition that there are more highway of tears victims."

The remains of only four women have been found, despite massive searches, and no suspects have ever been arrested.

The disappearance of Tamara Chipman, a vivacious 22-year-old who was last seen hitchhiking near Prince Rupert on Sept. 21 of last year, and the discovery a few months later of the body of Aielah Saric-Auger, 14, in a ditch near Prince George, triggered an outpouring of anguish that had been bottled up for years.

Concern over what was happening along Highway 16 began to build in 2002, when the family of Nicole Hoar, a 25-year-old tree planter from Red Deer, Alta., began a highly public search for their daughter, who was last seen hitchhiking.

She was never found.

The report, which was released yesterday on the fourth anniversary of Ms. Hoar's disappearance, said her case brought the term highway of tears into the broad public realm after local people began using it to express their "fear, frustration and sorrow."

Tom Chipman, a commercial fisherman in Terrace who spent months searching roadside ditches after the disappearance of his daughter, said he was encouraged the report included some of his recommendations.

Mr. Chipman attended the symposium last March, and suggested that public transportation be improved.

"You drive these roads and see the young people hitchhiking because they don't have any option. They aren't established yet with jobs and they don't have cars," he said.

"So if they want to get around, they don't have any other choice but to go out on the highway."
Mr. Chipman's call for improved transit is reflected in several recommendations, including one that calls for a fleet of seven shuttle buses on the highway.

"You need to get the hitchhikers off the roads," Mr. Chipman said.

"I think they are seen as just easy pickings by somebody."

The report defines itself as "a community response to a deadly serious situation."

It states that poverty is one of the common denominators that links the victims.
The report makes more than 30 recommendations, including calling for the RCMP to increase highway patrols during the summer-to-fall hitchhiking period.

It asks that 22 safe houses be established along the route so young women have places to stay and that a highway watch program be established in which residents with highway views are encouraged to call a crisis line whenever they see women hitchhiking.

It also calls for an emergency response plan to be put in place along the entire highway for the next time someone goes missing.

The report was posted on-line at: http://www.highwayoftears.ca/.
***
Highway of death

Citizens who live along Highway 16 in Northern British Columbia are organizing to try to protect hitchhiking women after nine have either disappeared or been found slain.
***
1. Aielah Saric-Auger: Slain and unsolved. Age 14, and a student at D.P. Todd Secondary School in Prince George. last seen by her family on Feb. 2, 2006, her body was found on Feb. 10, 2006, in a ditch along Hwy. 16 approximately 15 kilometres east of Prince George.

2. Tamara Chipman: Missing and unsolved. Age 22, disappeared on Sept. 21, 2005. She was last seen hitchhiking on Hwy. 16 near the Prince Rupert industrial park.

3. Nicole Hoar: Missing and unsolved. Age 25, from Alberta, was working in the Prince George area as a tree planter. She was last seen on June 21, 2002, hitchhiking form Prince George to Smithers on Hwy. 16.

4. Lana Derrick: Missing and unsolved. Age 19, disappeared on Oct. 7, 1995. Last seen at a gas station near Terrace (Thornhill), travelling east on Hwy 16 to her home in the Hazelton area. She was enrolled in studies at Northwest community College in Terrace.

5. Alisha Germaine: Slain and unsolved. Age 15, lived in Prince George, her body was found on Dec. 9, 1994.

6. Roxanne Thiara: Slain and unsolved. Age 15, disappeared in November, 1994, from Prince George. Her body was found just off Hwy. 16, near Burns lake.

7. Ramona Wilson: Slain and unsolved. Age 16, was hitchhiking to her friend's home in Smithers on June 11, 1994. Her remains were found near the Smithers Airport, along Highway 16, in April, 1995.

8. Delphine Nikal: Missing and unsolved. Age 16, disappeared form Smithers on June 14, 1990. She was hitchhiking east on Highway 16 from Smithers to her home in Telkwa.

9. Cicilla Anne Nikal: Missing and unsolved. Disappeared in 1989. Was last seen in Smithers near Hwy 16.

SOURCE: HIGHWAY OF TEARS SYMPOSIUM RECOMMENDATION REPORT