Small Town Films worked on the digital migration of the Audio Video collections of the West Kootenay Women’s Association and Dr Marcia Braundy, that document the history of Feminism in the West Kootenays. Parts of the archive were then compressed and uploaded to the project’s Youtube channel so the videos could be embedded into the project’s website – www.KootenayFeminism.com that also serves as a publicly accessible archive The project received support from the Irving K. Barber B.C. Historical Digitization Program and the Columbia Kootenay Cultural Alliance. Work in Progress.
Here is a sample from the archive:
C-4 Conference – Audrey Moore Part 1 Intro Moe Lyons
www.kootenayfeminism.com is the West Kootenay Women’s Association’s Digital History Project.
C 4 Conference: Confidence, Competence and Community Cooperation – Audrey Moore’s speech to the C-4 Conference:
Left, Right or Centre: Women’s Issues Cross Party Lines
Following an excellent introduction by MC Moe Lyons, Audrey Moore concluded the conference with her speech entitled “Left, Right, or Centre: Women’s Issues Cross Party Lines”. Audrey began by thanking Moe and saying she didn’t think in her many years of public life that she had ever been so well introduced. Audrey then proceeded to give what I can only describe as one of the most thoughtful and passionate speeches that I have ever heard. She truly summarized all that had occurred over the weekend while sharing her story. She began by saying that she had never really shared her story in this way before. Audrey also credited her mother for giving her encouragement at an early age to stand up for her rights. After graduating from university, marrying and starting a family Audrey embarked on many volunteer projects to fix facilities or raise funds for various causes. Due to her husband’s military career the family moved often, with new locations providing new challenges. Audrey explained how she transitioned from librarian at the Castlegar library to her many years in public life as a councillor, mayor, chairperson of the Union of BC Municipalities, board member of the Federation of Canadian municipalities, and chair of Selkirk College board. Throughout she brought the audience back to the conference title and themes as she explored the challenges and victories she encountered. Audrey ended her speech with the following question: “in 1973 when I first got on council there was one woman, me, over the ensuing years there was at most four women on council. Now, in 1998 there is but one woman. Why? Where are you? Why are you not there?”
The Confidence Competence and Community Cooperation Conference was held May 22-24, 1998 at Selkirk College Castlegar campus. The Conference opened on the Friday evening with a speech by Mary Woo Sims who was Chairperson of the BC Human Rights Commission at the time. Saturday morning workshops were followed by a speech by Dr. Margaret Fulton, Order of Canada recipient, ex Dean of Women at UBC and education consultant. Saturday afternoon and Sunday morning there were more workshops and then Audrey Moore, at the time, Chairperson of the Selkirk College Board, and former Mayor of Castlegar, gave the closing plenary speech.
In 1998 women were earning 67% of what men earned. The need for more women to get involved in the decision making bodies of their communities was readily apparent. By-in-large, the 1998 stats illustrated the inequality of representation between women and men: members of municipal councils 253 women 962 men; members of the House of Commons 60 women 240 men; members of the BC Cabinet 7 women 12 men; members of the Supreme Court 2 women 7 men; members of BC agencies boards and commissions 1528 women 1891 men; chairpersons of those agencies, boards & commissions 173 women 342 men.
by:
1998 2010 reflections on the c 4 conference jane burton
http://www.kootenayfeminism.com/timeline.php#1995