In April 2018, Fort McMurray Métis Local 1935 tasked Tara Joly and I with writing a report about the history of the Moccasin Flats evictions, an important event in the history of the Fort McMurray Métis community. Moccasin Flats was a predominantly Métis settlement along the southern bank of the Snye river at its confluence with the Athabasca River. We carried out oral history interviews and archival document analyses to address the importance of the space, the evictions, the impacts of the evictions, and opportunities for reconciliation. Between 1975-1981 The New Town of Fort McMurray collaborated with Northward Developments Ltd., the housing arm of Syncrude, to evict the Métis families at Moccasin Flats to build the Syncrude Towers housing complex, and a proposed marina, which was never built. By labelling the Moccasin Flats residents “squatters,” the Town used property law to justify their eviction, and ignore their Indigenous identity, history, and rights. The evictions fragmented the Moccasin Flats community. It also disrupted people’s relationships to the land, had cultural and socio-economic impacts, and has been a source of intergenerational trauma.
