A walk to raise awareness about the death of Boden Umpherville required a new starting point on Saturday after organizers were told they could no longer start a protest walk at the Prince Albert Royal Canadian Legion Hall.
The walk was part of a project organized by researchers from the University of Saskatchewan and Umpherville’s family. The focus was “over-protection” and “under-protection” by police. The walk began at the Gateway Mall instead.
Legion President Rick Hodgson said there was some miscommunication as to what would conclude the project. He said he was aware this was part of a research project, but did not know there would be a walk or what the topic was.
“From our side, we had rented the hall to the university thing assuming that they were teaching a course down there,” Hodgson said.
“We didn’t know that they were going to do a rally out of the building, a march, so I thought, well I better do something.
“They had advertised leaving from the Legion and I just kind of thought (we’d) better not get involved with something like.”
Chase Sinclair is an advocate for the case involving Umpherville and was part of the group who participated in the walk and workshops.
The walk was supposed to start at the Prince Albert Legion but the group was forced to change venues after being asked to leave by the Legion.
“We just got removed from a Legion,” Sinclair said. “We got kicked out of our last building that we were at and they said that we have to get out because we (The Legion) are not supporting anybody that talks against the police.”
On Thursday and Friday, members of Umpherville’s family were at the Legion working on a project that investigated experiences of “over-protection” or “under-protection” by police.
The project was led by a team of researchers from the University of Saskatchewan.Julie Kaye an associate professor at the University of Saskatchewan, said researchers have been holding art space workshops in Saskatoon, and wanted to expand around the province.
The first workshop on Thursday was for close family and intimate relations and the second day was a wider workshop open to the public. The idea for a walk came from the family, who thought it would be a good way to conclude the Prince Albert event.
“Something that the family wanted is to memorialize the passing of Boden and to memorialize his killing, so what they really wanted was to be able to host a walk,” Kaye said.
Hodgson said that the Legion supported the education and research part of the project but not the walk on Saturday because of the aspect of protest.
“We decided to not let them march out of the Legion and asked them to find a different place, and they did,” Hodgson said.
“Like I said, if it would have been cleared up a little before we would not have had this situation,” he added.
He explained that the Legion was aware of the teaching aspect of the research project.
Hodgson said that the Legion rules do not allow them to be involved in politics and religion.
“I have talked with the provincial president (Carol Pederson) about what happened and she said it was the right thing to do,” Hodgson said.
Hodgson said that they also addressed The Royal Canadian Legion Dominion Command.
He explained that the entire situation has changed the way the Legion thinks about renting their hall space.
“I guess we will have to put more into our Hall rental applications as what the event you are doing is involved with,” he said.
Hodgson said he had a conversation on Friday evening with one of the representatives from the University of Saskatchewan and explained that the Legion did not want to be used as the starting point for the walk on Saturday.
“It’s not like the Legion was supporting it or was against it. It was just the Legion name,” he said.
“Hopefully it is not going to get blown out of proportion,” Hodgson added.
The Daily Herald contact the University of Saskatchewan for comment. A spokesperson said it was the PA Legion’s decision to make regarding their space, and the university will respect their wishes.
michael.oleksyn@paherald.sk.ca
