'We can just be people again:' Inmates at Saanich jail carve totem pole as healing step

Behind the walls of a jail in Saanich, B.C., there are people working on a totem pole.

Since last summer, some 70 inmates have chipped away at the pole at the Vancouver Island Regional Correctional Centre. It's a project they say gives them a moment to forget they're locked up.

"We can just be people again," one man told CTV News. "You know, they don’t look at us as inmates when we’re out here."

Carver Tom LaFortune, who leads the project, only has one rule: Everyone is on a first name basis.

"The level of respect between the residents and the staff has risen so much because they get to see the real side of each other," said LaFortune.

The totem carving project at the Vancouver Island Regional Correctional Centre is shown. Aug. 18, 2022. (CTV News)

The project's founder, Max Henry, says the totem pole project creates a sense of community and connection to First Nations culture.

"It’s just a chance to reconnect and hopefully get them back on the right road to a better life after this, so they never come back," he said.

However, the project also points to a problem in the province, highlighting the fact that Indigenous people are overrepresented in the jail system.

The province says roughly six per cent of adults in B.C. are Indigenous, but Indigenous people make up 35 per cent of people currently in custody.

The totem carving project at the Vancouver Island Regional Correctional Centre is shown. Aug. 18, 2022. (CTV News)

The BC First Nations Justice Council attributes that overrepresentation to the ongoing effects of colonial harms.

B.C. Public Safety Minister Mike Farnworth says a "B.C. First Nations justice strategy" is underway and is focused on diverting people from jail.

Farnworth, who was at the Vancouver Island Regional Correctional Centre on Wednesday, says programs like this help.

"It’s that whole range of why people end up being incarcerated," he said. "I mean [colonialism] is clearly one of the critical aspects, and then on top of that, looking at alternatives to just incarceration."

The totem carving project at the Vancouver Island Regional Correctional Centre is shown. Aug. 18, 2022. (CTV News)