IceHutRentals has now posted an apology to its Facebook page.
It reads, "To Local Native Canadians, We sincerelly apologize from the bottom of our hearts for the confusion and thusly hurtful feelings that may have resulted from our poorly worded kijiji ad. Our ad was not ment to imply you are not welcome at our huts. Everyone is welcome at our huts on Sunset Point, Lake Nipissing. While in our huts we kindly ask you to obey the house rules. Everyone in our huts is to fish under one set of rules and regulations. You may still fish with us as long as Ontario 2017 fishing regulations are followed. This is to ensure our fishing location is not abused and that every guest in our huts is on a level playing field. Again we sincerely apologize for any hurt feelings and confusion our poorly worded ad has caused. My mother taught me to treat everyone equally. We are color blind. We are sorry."
Sincerely, Marc David Hyndman
CEO IceHutRentals.ca
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Original story:
A Kijiji ad for a local ice hut rental company has created a storm of protest on social media.
The ad, for IceHutRentals.ca ends with "Please no status card users. You are not welcome in our huts. Equality for all or you will not get the time of day from us and will lose any deposit paid to us."
A reader has also pasted the ad on the company's Facebook page with the comment by Susan Pellerin "Wow this is Racism !!!"
A call by BayToday to the company was not returned by time of publishing.
One First Nation person, who identified himself only as Jasper, tried to rent an ice hut from the company and told BayToday that he was refused based on his status.
"He asked for a deposit and I said, 'that was fine' and he said 'I've got to stop you here. Do you have a status card.' and I said 'I most certainly do' then he told me I couldn't rent his ice shacks because he said 'equality for all'. He said, 'If I paid any deposit I would lose it and if I got someone else to rent an ice shack and I got caught fishing in it I would lose the deposit and he would kick me out of the ice shack.
"He said, 'didn't you read my ad?' and I said I read about renting an ice shack and he said 'well scroll down a little further' so I got my phone and scrolled down and read right in his ad that he won't rent to people that are status natives.
"You don't discriminate against people, no matter what race you are. North Bay is a friendly town. I've lived in North Bay all my life and never dealt with that before. I treat everybody the same it doesn't matter if they are white. It doesn't matter what colour you skin is. My money is just as green as anybody else's."
BayToday will be updating this story.
