As the Friday morning sun was coming up, the statue of Sir John A. Macdonald was coming down.
Kingston city council voted 12-1 in favour of removing the statue from City Park.
The decision comes in the wake of the horrific discovery of 215 Indigenous children found in unmarked burial sites outside a former residential school in Kamloops, B.C., a school system that Macdonald was instrumental in facilitating.
“Now our people can heal, all those residential school survivors can heal, all those 60’s Scoop people can finally heal.” Kingston resident Lisa Cadue said.
The statue was officially taken down by city crews at approximately 9 a.m., and is being carried away from City Park on a flatbed truck.
Council decided to stash the statue in storage for the time being, and could potentially relocate it to Macdonald’s gravesite in Cataraqui Cemetery.
As for what will go up in its place as City Park, there’s no plan put in place yet.
“We want to see a memorial to indigenous people and the trauma’s that we’ve been through.” Kingston resident, Susan DeLisle said.
Along with the statue, Ecole Sir John A. Macdonald Public School will be removing Macdonald’s name from the school at the end of June, and will begin the renaming process at the beginning of the next school year.