Northern Division led by First Nation housing specialists

Olympic Building Supplies has been engaged in the serious problem of First Nations housing since 1991 when they opened a division led by Bob Topp. The company has been putting housing into remote northern communities ever since, often using innovative designs and materials, moving housing by whatever method it takes to get there.

These are ready to move stick-built houses, and they moved housing units to Fort Severn, Ontario, the northern-most community in the province, these containing SIP (structurally insulated panels) built by a manufacturer in Calgary, “The community is using oil heat above the tree line and the federal government pays for the shipping of this at great expense. The EMER CORE building envelope works to upgrade insulation R-values to an R-44, a true value that is three times the norm, and the federal government is willing to pay for using this in the north.

“We have been in building supply doing everything up to post and frame since I joined in 1991 to created and open up the First Nation division. I have been doing First Nation housing projects myself since 1982,” says Topp. “We are two guys running the division both working directly with First Nation communities. The division is now called northern sales, or Wakeegan, and I’ve been doing it long enough for some of the chiefs to remember me from their youth.” 

He says Olympic is always ready to improve design and quality to fit limited budgets or build for extreme weather condition, “SIP Panel engineered systems were delivered to Fort Severn because the  feds pay for heating oil, and we justified the expense by factoring in the amount allowed by CMHC per house. A typical house in that region costs $7000 a year to heat.” 

Over the years Olympic has been engaged with numerous communities, considering Olympic Supply Northern Division contains decades of management experience working with First Nation on various building projects. “We work with design and quality of products and we’ve looked at many new ways and changed a lot of things within our department. We are enthusiastic about new products."

The material-delivered house is built with Olympic designs and plans, and post and frame buildings, or SIP panel building, “Whatever they are calling for we pull it together.  The northern market is a natural play for our company and, in 1991. we concentrated more business development  in northwest Ontario and northern Manitoba."

The company is careful to build financial relationships, "selective in making sure we get paid and jobs are getting done, everything is arranged to move onto site. The division employs five or six guys. Trying to fill a market with good business relationships  and that at the end of the day with projects that stand up to the test of time.”

Relationships and buildings are both long-standing, says Topp, “Jim Moyr and myself have 60 plus years combined, and I will eventually  be replaced by the likes of Andre Bayrack who is here now. He needs four or five years under his belt.”

Topp adds, “We’ve been involved in all types of building. We do multi-housing, band offices, crisis centres, police centres, stores, arenas, and various other buildings. One of the advantages we have our own design departments, taking design to a certain level, short of architecture, functional buildings like funeral homes, gas stations (one of these recently finished at Broken head First Nation).”

He says the commercial and residential and northern market focus will continue, “Another thing we do for First Nation communities is expedite product. We can move equipment and expedite movement of tools, parts, and equipment into communities. Transportation is our real niche. We can FOB to any community so they have a cost based on delivery by either road, winter road, aircraft, barge, rail,  even helicopter," (but that’s not a first choice).

Financial expertise key to make ‘potential’ into reality

 Gail Murray runs Vero Management Ltd., a 100 percent Aboriginal-owned company that balances many years of corporate banking and financial expertise with First Nations communities and economic development.

Murray is the General Manager of Vero Management Ltd.. When we met a couple years ago, it was while the world of business started to open up to First Nations. I was reading about things happening in First Nation economic development. Little did I know Murray played an instrumental role in developing incredible stories , literally breakthroughs in capacity building on many fronts.

More recently Murray saw a need, took the risk, and now it’s paying off. “The best part of it all is we are making a difference to First Nation communities we work with.” Just one year ago, Murray decided to form a management consulting practice. In her career, most recently the last decade, she was Regional Manager, Aboriginal Banking, RBC, B.C. District, and became intricately aware of First Nations community and economic development. She mastered a few financial turns in making success out of the unique challenges faced by First Nations. 

“Businesses and corporations alike were attempting to balance economic development with sustainable and healthier intentions.” 

Murray says, “Strong financial fundamentals are a critical component of any business or community development scenario." Murray believes the people she works with have professional backgrounds that fit an emerging business model, one that works within the environment to create wealth while sustaining the environment, “The business models developed in Canada with First Nations and Aboriginal groups could have a much broader application throughout the world of Indigenous People developing their economies. There is a global shift towards more socially and environmentally responsible development and support.”

There is a number of framework organizations monitoring this emerging economy, and Murray rapidly cites several, including Dow Jones Sustainability Index, Janzi Funds, and, “the Ecuador Principles, and other globally recognized benchmarks have been established to ensure socially and environmentally responsible development.” Whether it is First Nations or corporate clients  the objective is the same for Vero, “bringing a team of experts who are committed to making the outcome a success.” 

Business stories about First Nations used to be hard to find in the 1990s when I started looking and writing them up in all kinds of news outlets. Today we are beginning to see Aboriginal business reaching to new highs in the Canadian and world economy. The economy of the country is changing, Murray says, “We need to change and adapt to meet changing needs. Often this is through transitioning workers from one sector to another. ” She adds, “Developments of massive proportions are becoming increasingly common,” and all partners have critical financial decisions to make. “That’s where Vero will play a critical role.”

She adds, “It’s our goal to ensure First Nations are fully in front of the changes that take place in their territories.” Her company adheres to a philosophical statement: Vero Management Ltd. is Where Business and Social Responsibility Meet. By the way, Vero means ‘Truth’ in Latin.

Chief Ralph Dick leading We Wai Kai into a bright economic future

We Wai Kai First Nation has a growing portfolio of enterprises and economic development initiatives in the lands and waters of their traditional territories, and a good example of their success has occurred on May 18, 2010, when We Wai Kai officials held a Grand Opening of the Quinsam Crossing. Maurice Magowan, Comptroller for We Wai Kai, says, "We held the opening to thank the contributors on the Quinsam Crossing project for slogging through the mud all winter on building on the site."

The We Wai Kai Nation held the Quinsam Crossing Grand Opening to showcase the development strategy for its 60-acre Quinsam Crossing commercial site on Willis Road, Campbell River, B.C..  Magowan said, "Quinsam Crossing is a traditional crossroads for travelers on the North Island for several centuries. It is being developed as a destination retail and recreation gateway to Campbell River for the North Island."

The Quinsam lands are southwest of downtown Campbell River and are, "well situated to receive the heavy flow of tourist traffic along the Inland Island Highway. Once developed to completion this service centre will be the nearest to the Campbell River and District Regional Airport."
 

Magowan notes that the first business founded on these lands is a We Wai Kai-owned auto service centre that includes a convenience store and propane filling centre. Future development plans include a broad mix of retail, commercial and recreational uses.

 

"The We Wai Kai business plans involved initial studies that suggested Quinsam Crossing could generate full and part-time employment for 580 people during construction and 650 to 800 operational jobs once it is up and running."

In addition, up to 1,500 indirect jobs could be created from this development. Magowan adds that, "Chief Ralph Dick's vision for this property has been clear, consistent and tireless. He has worked for many years to articulate and carry out the strategy developed throughout the decades by elders of the We Wai Kai Nation to bring greater equality, prosperity and employment to its people."

Another We Wai Kai economic initiative is found in the We Wai Kai Seafood Corporation. Shawn O'Connor operates the corporation, "We did this pilot project with Island Scallops to replace the disappearing salmon and herring fishery with submerged-line technology to grow scallops," says Shawn, "and we are growing them in the Suttle Channel of Johnstone Strait," beside Quadra Island and We Wai Kai's Indian Reserve No. 9.

O'Connor says We Wai Kai has members with sets of skills that mesh with the scallop growing industry's technology, "Piloting seign boats and running hydraulics technology and other skills taper nicely into the development." The corporation awaits assignment of tenure to their two year development, which is, "operating under a temporary industrial use permit to be converted tenure."

The scallop development in Johnstone Strait is essentially invisible to Quadra Island residents because growing the scallops is done by submerged line and the only signs of development are navigation buoys that mark the site.  O'Connor says, "Right now we have 500,000 scallops growing in the pilot-phase of the project. Two and half to four million scallops would be a commercially viable operation."

We Wai Kai was assiduous in selection of the site, "We wanted an even tide and nutrient rich waters with good anchorage. It turns out we found an excellent site because the scallops are just about ready to harvest in their 2nd year," a growth rate that is exceedingly fast comparatively speaking, as many scallop developments work on four-year cycles.

We Wai Kai has created six jobs currently and  O'Connor says the employees are keenly motivated to work in a sustainable industry that operates on the 'green' side of the fishery. "No feed or supplements are put in the water. It's lines and cages and monitoring, plus the site creates habitat for small finfish feeding off the ecology of scallops." Due to this ecological input, sports fishers are catching cod near the site for the first time in many years, says Shawn.

The initiative was inspired by Chief Ralph Dick about six years ago and commenced two years ago. Island Scallops' Les Rombough says, "They want to do this on their own and they have the skills to do it. We supplied scallop seed, equipment, and expertise to get it started. We could take this to any First Nation that is interested. It has been absolutely phenomenal to see the project develop with the fishing expertise of the people on the site."

He notes there are significant start-up costs to deal with "boats, plus the expense of our equipment, including long-lines, rope, anchors, pearl nets and lantern nets. There is no positive cash flow until two years in, and no profit for at least four years. Wages and tenures and other expenses are all paid up front."

Looking for the way forward in a Mountain Pine Beetle devastated forestry industry

First Nations Forestry Council is an organization formed from a specific mandate, says Keith Atkinson, Chief Executive Officer, "The Mountain Pine Beetle (MPB) is the main reason why the FNFC was formed in the early 2000s." With $300 million flowing to bio-energy development out of the forestry disaster in Canada the FNFC is actively promoting bio-energy development, "First Nations need to be involved."

Atkinson believes First Nation communities are fighting for their lives in the face of the MPB, "We cannot abandon our communities." Foremost, the MPB creates huge potential for biomass development, "The beetle may have peaked in its destructive force in B.C.," says Atkinson, "but enormous killing of trees continues."

Atkinson explains, "The FNFC began out of the MPB crisis. Millions of dollars were initially committed and the First Nations were included in the $100 million a year funding scheme, with $20 million a year earmarked for First Nations." Twenty percent of the federal commitment was designated to First Nation communities.

When the federal government first transferred $100 million to the province, "First Nations saw $8.4 million." Forestry is a multi-billion dollar industry in Canada. Rather than meeting the commitment, "In four years we saw $20 million for First Nations to do assessments and identify the impact of the MPB, and list the First Nation priorities to deal with it."

Atkinson notes that 50 percent of the 200 First Nation communities in B.C. are directly affected by the MPB blight, yet the federal government changed course in the middle of the funding program. From then on the federal government began diverting funding to national organizations for distribution through Natural Resources Canada and Western Diversification.

"Our agreement with the province of B.C. broke down. We continued to try and monitor the funding situation through working groups, to share and coordinate what money we received. The dollars started to flow and then it changed."

It's about the money because, "The number one issue is forest fuel management," which, Atkinson notes, "is fuel created by the MPB. Then comes the risk of forest fires. We have to make an urgent effort to mitigate against the forest fire hazard. These fires are increasing in severity and so is the incidence of interface fires," where cities like Kelowna and towns like Lillooet face  devastating infernos.

Indian Reserve communities are always in peril in spring, summer and fall today. "We have a lot of work to do on reserves because the biomass fuel is constantly interfacing with these communities. The cost of treatment to reduce fire risk increases every year," and Atkinson estimates it is currently $135 million a year. "We've submitted funding proposals over and over and they always get culled down."

He says the First Nations require $20 million a year in B.C. over the next three years, $60 million, to reduce the threat to communities. Instead of funding, FNFC continues a four year battle to find a place in funding schemes that would reduce the threat to communities. "We are down to $2 million a year and we have the local rural First Nations willing to do the work but the money isn't there."

It's a difficult situation for an organization that was established for the purpose of fighting a pestilence that threatens the safety and existence of Canada's first people. "Our industry is facing a new kind of forestry. Restoration is the goal and we want communities to be running their own programs. It includes cultural and social sustainability of these communities. We also need to participate in the research of climate change."

Atkinson says the communities are structured for biomass fuel management and proper funding would enable economic development. The FNFC worked diligently from the outset to design a strategy based on $20 million a year for ten years. "The present Prime Minister says he will supply $1 billion to fix the problem, but he fails to recognize the 20 percent agreed for First Nations."

The federal government put the money into existing federal departments effectively bypassing First Nations. Furthermore the money available causes competition between First Nations for available funds. This unexpected diversion has shattered the organization of support. "Most people recognize First Nation issues today," says Atkinson, "and they know a few things about our plight."

It's a fact, "When you give money to First Nation communities it ends up in the hands of non-Natives, but when you give it to non-Native communities it never ends up in First Nation hands. And we're not trying to do this alone. We have a protocol agreement with the BC Bioenrgy Network to showcase 'best practices' and show the way to replicate success."

In short, the FNFC is working toward a governance model that works with industry and business and which could ultimately lead to solid government-to-government relations and increased certainty for economic progress. "Everybody needs First Nations full participation to support the forestry strategy.

Tla-o-qui-aht’s Canoe Creek Hydro a work of reclamation and restoration

Sayo Masso is liaison officer for the Tla-o-qui-aht First Nation in one of their major initiatives, the Ha'uukmin Tribal Park, including the Upper Kennedy watershed, as a place of cultural and economic importance, "We conducted ceremonial gatherings and visited sacred sites," said  Masso.  "Pools in the river provided an abundant fishery to families and there was a village at the mouth of the Kennedy River."

The tribal park contains (in part) the Upper Kennedy River, "Our people moved through lakes in the winter and returned to the ocean in season," said  Masso. "We lived on the coast during summer and as a whaling people we observed the migration patterns of gray whales." Potlatch culture is hereditary and Nuu-Chah-Nulth communities like Tla-o-qui-aht are linked by close families, common meetings at winter feasts, and a lot of kinship with other coastal communities; interestingly, said  Masso, "Some of our closest ties are with the Makah Nation in Washington State."

Bringing the Ha'uukmin Tribal Park to life on behalf of Tla-o-qui-aht First Nation "seemed to take forever," said  Masso, "and years of research was followed by years of implementation including the last couple of years of serious dialogue. We had to study the area closely in terms of hydrology and fish habitat, institute a stream keeper’s course, and begin teaching members to be park guardians and stream keepers. We're really happy this is happening as we speak."

The Tla-o-qui-aht desire to share the magnificent lands and waters of their heritage is not carte blanche; visitors will be made aware of Tla-o-qui-aht stewardship, said  Masso, "Self-determination is on the horizon. We have focussed the initial effort on the Upper Kennedy before we construct new hatcheries," Chinook salmon and sockeye to be reared in separate hatcheries, Chinook hatchery to be built first.

The Tla-o-qui-aht place name for Kennedy River Basin, Haa'uukmin, is "roughly translated as Feast Bowl." The Kennedy Basin is about 60 km from Tofino and the Canoe Creek Hydro project presents the administration with an infrastructure opportunity to create wider visitations to their tribal park. "We are planning to establish a family-oriented picnic area by the Canoe Creek Run-of-River hydro generating station and we have envisioned our land use plan for long-term development in outlying forestry, gravel pits, and out-posts for adventure tours. Guardian and stream keeper courses are giving the administration a professional presence in our tribal park 

He added, "In upcoming phases of the Tribal Park, we will be providingrangering services and safe transit through a network of trails, and access fees will contribute to building and implementing tribal park objectives. We are examining carbon credits to value our trees while they're standing. Tla-o-qui-aht faces systemic issues in Canadian forestry," and will use every means to circumvent the slaughter of forests, "Carbon Credits help us assert a role in using and managing the watershed in a manner that reflects Tla-o-qui-aht Laws of Iisaak, (~Respect), and Hishukish Tsawaak, (Everything is one ~interconnectedness of Life)."

Tla-o-qui-aht implemented two land use zones in their traditional territory; one is entitled Uuyaathluknish Management Zone, which means 'We take care,' and  Masso said, "This is a management area that needs gentle impacts and restoration plans. Use and access must be sustainable and not negatively impacting water quality objectives and fish stock objectives." Qyaasinhap, the second management zone - Leave as you've found it, is generally allocated to the Old Growth Forest corridors in Clayoquot River Valley and Clayoqout plateau.

Uuyaathluknish is already impacted and needs rehabilitation, which is being done in part through the Canoe Creek Hydro project, "We promoted the hydro development in the rehabilitation area, an area already impacted by the highway and logging," an area that requires careful management for the multiple uses that are visioned. "On this side is the low-impact sustainable use area our plans says, Let's deliver fish out of this watershed."

Qyaasinhap is putting wider stewardship back in the local area of the central westcoast and Tofino, said  Masso. 'Leave it as you found it' means the Clayoquot Arm and Plateau Preserve will continue to serve as ground zero for research in climate change and education-oriented relations with colleges and universities. There is a research Centre up Clayoquot Arm and we working with the University of Victoria and with other education institutions to college-certify training in stewardship, and other research partnerships.

"Meanwhile we have two forest licenses in our territory," said  Masso, "and the thinking is that we have to do whatever is needed to move forestry to be more sustainable for our grandchildren and to create a 150-year rotation on harvesting rather than the present 80 rotation. We will examine timber uses and plan the harvest ourselves. We will evaluate the forest companies by how many jobs they create for how many trees they take, not by how many millions it makes."

History contains a couple of important drivers for the established tribal park. "Families quarantined themselves back in the Kennedy watershed during the introduction of plagues," and later, "The Meares Island court case acknowledged the Island in Clayoquot Sound as Tla-oqui-aht TitleLand in 1984, which laid the groundwork for the Hawiih (hereditary chiefs) to work on establishment of the Meares Island Tribal Park declaration.  This declaration formed the framework for the Tribal Park at Kennedy Lake."

As a matter of purely cultural concern the nation requires a quantity of old growth fir and cedar to carry on traditional practices of the potlatch, "We have canoe carvers and totem poles and Long Houses to build."

Mining is an optimist’s game

It was fundamentally important for the Terrane Metals Mt. Milligan Mine project to hold its own. “We are at the federal permitting and environmental assessment phase,” said Ryan King, Terrane Metals Investor Relations, in 2009, “We’re probably one year away from construction,” he said , “It will be 2012 before production starts on copper concentrate to be smelted in Asia.”

The company placed orders for industrial machinery and equipment to be installed at the mine site. Glen Wonders is Vice President of Corporate Affairs and Sustainability for Terrane Metals at Mt. Milligan Mine, and works with local parties affected by the mining operations scheduled to ensue 155 km northwest of Prince George, B.C..

“It is very hard to access debt capital at the moment, lending institutions are very cautious,” said Wonders. He was, like everyone, “waiting for investor confidence to return. It’s not about our mine. You have to keep the problems in perspective. It remains a favourable mine,” he said.

“You have to be an optimist to be in mining. Miners as a group are always optimistic.” He said the Mt. Milligan Mine is in the midst of federal and provincial permitting processes while the Environmental Assessment has been done on the provincial side and a technical review is underway on the federal side.

One of the most important functions for Wonders is liaison with First Nations. “Our engagement with First Nations is detailed in the discussions about employment. The mine means potential jobs for First Nations people if the mine receives all needed approvals and financing,” said Wonders. Those he has been involved with are from Ft. St James, McLeod Lake, West Moberly, and Halfway First Nations. “The mine is on the treaty land of McLeod Lake First Nation,” said Wonders.

The Nak’azdli First Nation took umbrage with the claim that the project is backed by the First Nation on whose lands it is located. They recently disputed the McLeod Lake claim to the territory. Wonders lived in Prince George for many years and is aware of the crisis in forestry jobs that surrounds the region, reducing employment in towns like Mackenzie and Ft St James north of Prince George. “The mine is a beacon of light for a lot of people.”

Angelique Merasty Levac discusses how God Opens Doors

Angelique is author of a book entitled God Opens Doors, Kisemanitow Peyohtena Iskwahtem, in print September 2012. The publisher is Indian Life Ministries, and they have followed her art and business career and admired her Christian walk for many years.

"I was born at Midnight Lake, Manitoba," said Angelique Merasty Levac. "It is bush and nobody lives there,” in the far northern reaches of central Canada. Angie holds close to her memories of a distant place spent with her grandparents in the decades of the 1950s and 1960s. She was toddling around the wilderness with her grandparents from the time she was a one year old. That was when she was born, and her mother had a rush of kids come, and so Angie was given to the grandparents to raise. Today, the same place is as wild as it once was, when she was a babe in the woods. “Once in a while a few of my siblings or family members traps there.” It is a Cree people’s playground and belongs to no one else.

I lived beside a nice lake," and she enjoyed the company of loons going 'co-co-op' in the morning hours, she recollects, "My grandparents tried to teach me how to trap when I was six years old." Her grandmother gave her a tiny squirrel trap and showed her where to set the trap under a bundle of roots at the base of a tree.

They were on the lakeside close to the family dwelling, which was a large canvas tent, and Angie would not stray. Her grandmother, she recalls, provided explicit instructions about being very patient when trapping. She had to leave the place alone to permit the process to take its course.

Little Angie couldn’t wait till the grandparents went to sleep and she approached her fledgling trap-line to see if she was enriched. She stuck her six year old hand into the squirrel-sized cubby hole and trapped herself, snap. “Ouch,” she hollered, with a sudden affinity for nature, for the squirrel that wasn't there.

It was a lesson that she can freshly recall, and she smiles about the painful few minutes while she inspects her feminine fingers. This trapping snarl proved to be the end of Angelique Merasty Levac's life as a trapper (and a few families of bushy tailed squirrels have reason to chatter in gratitude).

Those years in the lakes district straddling the Manitoba-Saskatchewan border were made up of the old itinerant way of connecting with the land and which had ever made the vast domain their home. Angie’s grandpa always found it necessary to break camp and find a different place every few weeks, for he was a trapper, hunter, and fisherman.

"My grandpa never lived in one place," Angie explained, and the family packed their large tent and barrel stove and set off looking for the right place in a particular time of year. She said it was a lean existence.

"I used to help my grandmother gather branches she used to make a floor inside the tent. There was nothing to play with when I was a child,” a fact she once pointed out to her grandma. She told her she wanted a doll, so her grandma made Angie a doll. “Do you know what my doll was? We had a flour sack and she tied up the bag into a rag doll, eyes made from the soot of the fire. That was my doll.”

At 9 years of age Angie began to spend more time with her mother and less time with her grandparents when she came to be old enough to be more help to her mother, who was by now raising most of the twelve children she bore on the Lynn Lake railroad line in northern Manitoba.

At this point Angie remembers watching the birch bark biting when she went out with ladies on berry picking sojourns. “The blue berries found in burned out areas, and cranberries found in forested places.”

It was the cranberry picking trips where she saw the women take respite to conduct little competitions. They would peel birch bark and make pieces of art with their teeth but Angie was too young to think much about it. It was a first impression of the way the ladies had social exchanges by causing exquisite artistic impressions by birch bark biting. She remembers a few of them got tossed away.

It was not until much later that she herself would adopt and perhaps help to preserve a fast disappearing cultural practice of the Woodland Cree. It was her destiny to become a Cree cultural icon and reigning expert of a disappearing form of First Nation culture. Over the past three decades Angie garnered a lot of attention for the artistic skill at birch bark biting. She still does, with beautiful straight teeth, with which she takes on the task of an ancient artistic craft (she flosses regularly).

It is a strangely important coincidence that when she met her mentor of the art form the woman was also named Angelique Merasty (Angie’s maiden name). The mentor Angelique Merasty has passed away but not before she almost miraculously passed the legacy onto Angelique Merasty Levac, doing so under the most difficult conditions imaginable.

Angie’s gravitation to the art form is partly owed to bingo. Her mentor Angelique Merasty loved to play and was sitting waiting for a taxi ride to the bingo hall one evening in Beaver Lake, Saskatchewan. Part of the miracle was that the mentor sat in the company of an anthropologist while she waited, and to pass the time sitting beside the fire in winter she reached over and peeled a piece of birch bark off a log that had thawed, and she bit into it, and an exquisite piece of art was born.

The taxi arrived and she cheerfully, wordlessly (for she never spoke English) handed the birch bark biting to the professor who promptly sent it to the Manitoba Museum of Man in Winnipeg, and this prompted a full investigation and revelation of her ability. Soon articles began to appear detailing the art and the artist. And the mentor while being interviewed once expressed a wish to pass the craft along to someone before it was forgotten. Angelique the student saw this quote in a magazine article when she was 24 years of age

It is important to realize the way Angie grew up. She did not speak English until she was between 14 and 15 years of age; she spoke only Cree. She grew up in the days prior to Bill C-31 in Canada when a lot of Indian people were cut off from their Status by marriage, and Angie had no access to school, therefore, because her mother had been stripped of her Status by marriage to a Metis man.

Indeed, our Angie did not read English until she taught herself by reading the Holy Bible, and by the time she was 24 she had proficiency enough to read, and there she stood in a line-up at the post office in Uranium City, amazed to see her name described in a magazine.

She stared at the magazine story about Angelique Merasty, but it was not herself, except it was her name, a woman who was a practitioner of an ancient art form, a Cree culture art form, the artform she had seen her grandmother and mother practicing in the berry patches, and this same Angelique Merasty in the article described how she, "would like to pass this Native art form onto another."

Angie had those recollections of the ladies in the berry patches taking a rest to bite into birch bark and she decided thereabouts that the passing ought to be to herself. She credits the worship of God, "The Lord put that in my heart. Since I did it, it opened doors that I never dreamed of," including a visit to Bill Cosby in Philadelphia, USA, with a guest appearance on his remake of the TV classic 'You Bet Your Life.' She was interviewed by Keith Morrison on CTV, and appeared on BCTV, APTN, the Knowledge Network, and in numerous print articles, including this one in the nationwide Native Journal, and more awards to come in 2009. 

(For more information email dialogueondevelopment@gmail.com

Commercial Law Absent in First Nations Life

Economic development is a promising direction for First Nations in Canada, especially since the process has come under close scrutiny from coast to coast. University of Toronto Law School hosted a unique forum on First Nation economic development in 2008. “I think the most important thing is that everyone recognizes First Nation economic development is a political matter,” said the event moderator.

Holding an economic development conference at a law school should come as no surprise. Commercial law in Canadian life is huge, and until now, seemed strangely inconsequential to First Nations. Professor Doug Sanderson and other law faculty attended an intriguing luncheon address on day two of the conference highlighted by a speech delivered by Hon. Michael Bryant, Aboriginal Affairs minister, who suggested the need to create commercial law courts for First Nation reserves.

“How much of law in Canada is commercial law?” we asked. “Oh, about 60 percent or more,” Professor Sanderson replied. It is this type of law that sews up jurisdictional economics, and it is this law that is unavailable to aboriginal people. Aboriginal people are born under a completely different set of rules. Does not a single realization come to light that the Indian Act excludes a race of people from the economy by depriving access to commercial law? First Nation economic development is, in reality, written out of the realm of mainstream economics. A system of trusteeship holds all wealth, and monitored activity on an Indian Reserve has to be decided by a Minister of Indian Affairs. 122 sections of the Indian Act to make this potentate’s role very clear in the lives of aboriginal people. They are not allowed to have money.

Aboriginal economic development became a legal academic exercise with a national focus because the minster of Aboriginal Affairs in Ontario was arresting and jailing elders from Kitchenaumaykoosib Innunwig who protested Platinex Mines. Perhaps, it was out of frustration that the minister spoke to the matter as one of commercial rather than criminal concern. He called for a system to be put in place to accommodate the legal concerns of the First Na tions.

This is a fact of law, that a political document (the Indian Act) apparently deprives First Nations of a legal framework to possess money. The session’s moderator said solutions to these substantial concerns of legality are currently being sought. He believes people are only beginning to meet to address economic matters at the political level. Sanderson added that the situation is made even worse because a “settler versus native” attitude prevails and political issues remain unresolved. He noted the situation at Caledonia (and could have included the mind-boggling threat to personal security undergoing Mohawk people when they go to the store).

Sanderson said, “There are many ways for First Nations and corporate Canada to act together. . .The current political reality demands that thought and speech gravitate around ways to do economic development.” Sanderson also suggested that the best example for a way forward was cited in Minister Bryant’s speech when Bryant raised the subject of the Chocktaw Tribal Council (CTC) in the USA. The CTC has a federally-constituted commercial law court that governs activities under their jurisdiction along the Mississippi. They have American Indian judges and Chocktaw commercial law.

Teaching a treasured and ancient craft in birch bark

The Bark Canoe Store opened in 2000 in Spokane, “originally operating by making birch bark canoes,” explains John Lindeman, owner, “and it expanded to providing birch bark for cabinet and furniture and construction, then expanded to accessories and things that might go along with birch bark canoes like Hudson Bay axes, packs, materials, then came delivery of birch bark canoe building classes.

 "We are known for taking courses to communities," often First Nation communities. "I wanted the building of birch bark canoes to revive by going to the people who originally built them, starting in Minnesota, going as far as Alaska, also to Nebraska, school museums around the country, wherever they wanted, building birch bark canoes in as little as three weeks to a month.”

 These canoe construction classes reach everyone from kids to elders, “and we were doing camps in Canada, also holding classes in Spokane where people got together and each made a single canoe in a group project. In other classes individuals came to build one for themselves.” Birch bark is one medium of construction for the canoes, but usage is demanding on vessels, especially in activities such as film-work or cultural reenactments, “a crowd that wanted a resilient fibreglass replica, so we make a whole variety ot those.”

The company sells birch bark laminates that work over substrates of plywood to make panelling for walls, cabinets, a birch bark finish that is, “very pretty,” says Lindeman, “lots of Canadian customers.” Panels, likewise canoes, have sold in Europe. Most of the birch bark comes from New Hampshire, Maine, Minnesota, before he found a contact in Siberia, “Now I am importing from Siberia, which birch bark is used in building the canoes.”

 A lot of the birch bark is reclaimed from dead trees found near the border of Nelson, B.C., “There is a lot of dying birch, I take the birch bark found there for furniture, not canoes.” Regarding the dying birch, Lindeman says, “the birch tree is a canary in the coal mine,” it's telling us something about the environment. The spindly hardwood like alder, birch, maple, poplar grows up first in clear-cut, “what they will do is defoliate to kill hardwood and do this because no market exists for the hardwood,” essentially done after a clear-cut with the potential to stay in the ecosystem for 5000 years, he says, with an invasion with chemicals.

“I deliver courses year-round and am very portable with this. It is an intensive three weeks, whether making one canoe, or ten.” Where individuals are making their own canoe, up to four can participate in a course, in which it takes over 200 hours. The program works well at structured settings like museums, schools, and other institutions, “My goal is teaching the teachers at places like community centres, showing how to build any style from Great Lakes to Athabascan, Dogrib, we do all different traditional styles.”

There’s been some study done on this on Lindeman’s part, “I took a class in Wisconsin in 1992,” when he had a place in Port Wayne near Lake Superior, “Ojibway country,” he notes. He was taught by David Gidmark, who was trained by Algonquin elders in Quebec. “I’ve done two-seat miniatures up to 26 foot long, most typically 14 to 18 feet.” One fibreglass replica 36 foot canoe he made was used on Hudson River in New York,  “They bought a 20 foot birch bark and 36 foot that featured in the 500 year anniversary of Henry Hudson going up that river.”

Lindeman has done canoes for movies, “There is an on-going demand for this kind of building, every customer has their own unique situation from store to museum, and some canoes may never been seen alight on the water. The original canoes are not surprisingly kind of expendable, like the 26 foot Ojibway canoe that travelled from Keese River, Wisconsin to the Pacific by the Mackenzie River, and at the end the canoe was ceremonially burned. To those who lamented this happening, it is worth knowing even Mackenzies' canoes were destroyed by the end of the voyage.)

The aim is to restore the art of the birch bark canoe. “I want to revitalize the building of these canoes, which were formerly utilitarian, and now exist as an artform, I want to see more building going on.” He explains that the birch is used in multiple ways, building to medicine, “Medicinal companies are exploiting the birch tree, and it is known that birch bark is resistant to mold, and furthermore is used as an inner sole for shoes because it kills athletes foot.”

The fact is that those in the market for buying canoes for schools, say, to start a ricing program, “they would have aluminum and plastic canoes, they don't want to bang around birch bark canoes. That is the idea of the fibreglass ricing canoe, to re-establish a cultural practice in this form of canoe it handles like a ricing canoe, but it's fibreglass it will take a beating. You take care of the wood on the gunwales but the hull, you can leave it outside, you can ram it into the shore.”

August 2012 Dialogue on Development (west edition)

July 2012 Dialogue on Development business section: