Shell midden discovered at Sooke affordable housing development, delays opening

This story was originally published in The Westshore newsletter, May 17, 2022.

The building was nearly done; all that was left to do was landscaping and connecting the civic service lines. M’akola Housing Society and BC Housing expected to have tenants move into the affordable rental units on 2710 Chalmers Rd. in Sooke by April.

Until, that is, an excavator operator noticed a visible concentration of shells in the dirt: it looked like a shell midden.

Work stopped. An archaeologist confirmed that it is a midden, the T’Sou-ke First Nation was notified, and the midden was fenced off. The site was undocumented before, so now a full assessment is being done by T’Sou-ke and an archaeologist.

Their report will indicate how significant this midden is, and whether construction work would still be allowed. But it will take another 3-4 months to complete, so in the meantime, M’akola and BC Housing decided to look for alternate sites to install the civic works connection machinery.

The lead architect on the project, Alex McCumber, told The Westshore that engineers have identified a suitable place adjacent to the midden for the sewage lift station. Exploratory digs at the new site found no archaeological evidence, so the team is drafting up new plans to submit to the District of Sooke for approval.

The building could be ready for occupancy by autumn if all goes well. It’s a 6-month delay plus extra costs since all the new work wasn’t in anyone’s original quote. As expensive as the delay is, it could have been far worse, McCumber said.

“We were fortunate that it was not found in the centre of the property. Because of the modular nature of the building, all the modules were constructed even before site work had begun. Imagine if this had been discovered during initial excavation work? That could have been catastrophic,” he said.

The modular units were specifically, unalterably designed for that precise location. If an archaeological site had been beneath the building’s footprint, the entire building could have become scrap metal.

BC has more than 54,000 documented archaeological sites—such as culturally modified trees, traditional trails, house pits, and middens—and many more that aren’t in the registry. Sites like this are important for a lot of reasons. Culturally they are significant and meaningful because they contain material history of the Indigenous peoples in BC. They also provide legally relevant evidence of the rights and title to the land by Indigenous peoples.