Posts By: First Nations Drum

by Frank Larue

The recent Pacific Business and Law Institute Conference organized to inform the public of the immediate impact of the British Columbia Supreme Court report written by Justice Vickers on the Tsilhquot’in Nation Decision on Aboriginal Title and Right was unfortunately not that well-attended, but those of us who were there came away with a great deal more understanding of both the history of litigation and negotiation up to the present moment and the uncertainties which await future claims to be brought before the courts. The decision recently released has been hailed by all interested parties as the most significant trial judgment on Aboriginal title and rights since the Supreme Court of Canada decided the Delgamuukw case in 1997, and is the first case in which a court has concluded that evidence before it proves aboriginal title over certain lands, a decision the significance of which almost guarantees that it will be appealed. Therefore, its implications for future litigation and negotiation need to be clarified and understood at as profound a cultural level and with as little ambiguity as possible. The Vickers judgment has two major implications for the future: One, it demonstrates the type and degree of evidence required to prove aboriginal title; and two, while it reinforces the importance of the Crown’s obligation to consult and accommodate First Nations in respect of their claims of title and rights, it does not change the scope of the Crown’s duty in this respect.. Although the Crown did not make a final declaration on aboriginal title the Judge did state his opinion that the Tsilhquot’in Nation does in fact have title to a significant portion of the claim area estimated at approximately 200,000 hectares.

The original case was brought by Chief Roger William of the Xeni Gwet’in First Nation on its behalf and on behalf of the approximately 3,000 members of the Tsilhquot’in Nation, of which the Xeni Gwet’in is a part. The territory claimed is in the Cariboo-Chilctin region of Brirish Columbia near Williams Lake. The Court held that it could not make a final decision of aboriginal title or grant a legal remedy because of the way the case had been pleaded in the plaintiff’s Statement of Claim. However the judge did state an opinion on the basis of the evidence that the Tsilhquot’in did have aboriginal title to a significant portion of the area claimed. He also encouraged the parties to negotiate a swift resolution to the outstanding issues, and reconcile longstanding proceeding on the basis that the Tsilhquot’in do indeed have rights to hunt, trap, and trade in furs to sustain a moderate livelihood throughout the claims area. It is well-known that the Province of British Columbia has its own very serious differences from the rest of the country in how the treaty process has evolved over the years due to among other things its late arrival into Confederation and these differences resulted in a trial lasting 339 days and a written judgment of well over 400 pages. Had third party litigants such as corporations and individual landowners not been called to testify the results in both cases would have been even longer.

In any case, although no legal remedy resulted from the time and money spent on the case no matter what its outcome, certain rulings in the Vickers report do set precedents in areas extremely important for future claims. These relate to evidence, pleadings, legal procedure and costs, all of which will help in future litigation to streamline processes. In particular, Vickers ordered that the defendant provincial and federal governments pay a significant portion of the plaintiff’s costs and all of their out of pocket expenses. A procedure was also established to be followed by counsel whenever a witness was expected to give oral history testimony or oral tradition evidence in order to allow counsel for the defendants an opportunity to test the reliability of that evidence.

The trial judge also reviewed the extensive jurisprudence on aboriginal title and rights concluding that aboriginal title is a species of aboriginal right which confers a “right to the land itself.” The precise content of this right has yet to be established but at the very least it includes the right to exercise a degree of control over the resource activities which take place on the land. The Court decision left no doubt that the presence of the Tsilhquot’in people in the Claim Area has been uninterrupted and continuous from prior to 1846 (the year Britain acquired sovereignty over British Columbia) and up to the present time. (A description of these lands can be is available on the B.C. Courts’ website:www.courts.gov.bc.ca)

In coming to his conclusions the trial judge relied heavily on oral history and oral tradition because the Claim Area is “a remote part of the Province and it comes as no surprise that historical knowledge of the area is sparse.” Perhaps the most important implication emerging from the judgment is that the adversarial system of the Canadian courts is not equipped to resolve these claims and that reconciliation which is the ultimate objective of such consultation is in the end negotiation rather than litigation; that is to say how to reconcile the cultural continuity of ‘Indianess’ with the ongoing development of a modern society without ‘rubbing salt into old wounds’, a phrase appropriate to the situation we are left with after spending so much money and time to reach a conclusion that was obvious to the litigants in the beginning. The most glaring judgment is that we are in the position we are in because both levels of governments (federal and provincial) have not acted honorably over that past two centuries nor have they made good on the promises they have continually made when such cases have been brought to court.

By Clint Buehler

CALGARY – Joane Cardinal-Schubert credits her father with setting her on the path that would lead her to numerous awards for her art, and for her contributions as curator, writer, lecturer, poet, advocate for Native artists and activist on a variety of Aboriginal issues.

The most recent of her many awards, the 2007 National Aboriginal Achievement Award for Arts, will be presented at a gala event in Edmonton in March, as will awards to 13 other recipients in other categories.

Previous awards include an Honorary Doctor of Laws (LL.B) from the University of Calgary in 2003, the Queen’s Golden Jubilee Medal (2002), the Alumni Award of Excellence on the Alberta College of Art’s 75th Anniversary Celebration (also in 2002), the Commemorative Medal for contributions to the arts in Canada (1993), and election to the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts (RCA) in 1986.

Talking about her father’s influence, Joane says, “I was pointed at an early age toward the direction of creating things. It was my father who literally placed me in art school. I am looking and I am seeing with the eyes he taught me to use.

“Having a father who was a builder and innovator, I was exposed to a broad range of materials and media. I had seen blueprints and plans and sketches probably before I was four years old. Like most children, I was imitative so I used to construct things, draw anywhere I could and also sewed, designing clothes and making my own patterns from an early age. Of course I was born in an age when people still made things . . . it was normal.”

Her painting and installation practice is prominent for its incisive evocation of contemporary First Nations experiences and examination of the imposition of EuroAmerican religious, educational and governmental systems on Aboriginal people.
Born in 1942 in Red Deer, Alberta, of Blood Indian heritage, she attended the Alberta College of Art in the 1960s, then obtained her Bachelor Fine Arts from the University of Calgary in 1977. She was assistant curator at the University of Calgary Art Gallery in 1978, and curator of the Nickel Arts Museum in Calgary 1979 to 1985. She has been a lobbyist for the Society of Canadian Artists of Native Ancestry (SCANA), and an outspoken advocate of Native causes.

In addition to the exhibition of her artwork in dozens of solo and group exhibitions across Canada and internationally, it has been reproduced in numerous publications and is in numerous private, corporate and public collections. In addition she is in much demand as a lecturer and writer, and has been actively involved in video and theatre production.

Joane says she “fell into being a curator through interest, volunteerism and due to organizing skills from past experience in organizing events.”

Since 1988, Joane has volunteered with the Calgary Aboriginal Arts Society (CAAS). In the course of serving CAAS committees and board, including a term as president, “I’ve been able to help other artists by organizing annual exhibitions including their work. In 2001 we created the F’N (First Nations) Gallery, which allows us to hang small exhibitions year ‘round of both individual and group work.

“A few years ago we began to explore theatre, so I have gained a lot of experience in that area helping with several theatre productions.”

“I worked on the first video (Self Government –Talk about it) that was to become the Aboriginal Program at the Banff Centre and was one of the charter group who participated in the planning of the Aboriginal Program.”

Joane says writing is something she has been interested in since childhood. “I was an avid reader – about four books a night sometimes. I love writing – and particularly poetry. I wrote for years not worrying about being published. Then the University of Lethbridge’s Whetstone Press called me to use an image on their Aboriginal issue, and I told them I was closet poet. They asked me to send them some examples and they ended up publishing four or five poems. This happened in 1983 or so, and it seemed after seeing my work in print I took it more seriously.”
Joane’s belief that making issues known that need addressing is important, driving her advocacy efforts on many issues, such as having Aboriginal art displayed in public galleries and museums.

“I just joined in and contributed what I could from my point of view.”

But at the foundation of it all are her visual art creations, some of which are in such prestigious collections as the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa, the Museum of Civilization in Gatineau, Queen Elizabeth II, the Duke and Duchess of York, and Canadian Embassies in Tokyo, New York and Stockholm.
One of her most challenging projects is the major sculpture she was commissioned to create for the Calgary International Airport.
“I had known for years that I wanted to create a new view of the prairie horse out of the western context, and I knew that I wanted to honour the way the ancestors had drawn a horse on the pictographs that they left for generations to come.

“It seemed an obvious strategy to propose a horse as it was an important means of travel and transport of house, food, personal effects and goods. I have always been in love with the beautiful shape of the horse. I wanted to shape it out of plaster as it was immediate and would be under my direct control. The surface also lent itself to my style of notation and painterly quality.
Over the years, Joane says, she has often returned to the medium of plaster, making warshirts that fit her in the ‘80s, some rocks that were part of wall installations, work made in reference to bundles taken apart by then uninformed employees at the Glenbow Museum, the “one little, two little” wall installation at the Canadian Museum of Civilization. The “Gettysburg Address” cradleboard, as well as other baby plaster bundles and the final plaster 10 little Indians made while artist in residence in Winnipeg.

“I suppose (the horse) became a culmination of all the work up to that point. Also, it allowed me to work large, think big, and to use my skills.

“I have great respect for the airport authority and the architects for their continued belief in me over the time that it took to realize all the problems and work out the concept to a physical finale.
“There was no opening, no real dialogue, but I had evidence of people not being able to keep their hands off ‘horse.’
“It is quite amazing to be versed in art and the discipline of that “hands off” profession. I have had to repair the surface of horse twice. I have detected tracks on the top of its base from those kids’ sneakers with wheels on the soles. I have seen men’s sized tracks there also. I have witnessed grown men who pass the horse giving the rocks a resounding knock with their knuckles . . . quite amazing. I am considering starting a ‘friends of the horse society.’ But I also see how it engages people and children who are drawn to its curvilinear shape, and that makes me satisfied that it achieves its goal.”

Joane says her life and career are about the joy of discovery, curiousity, the journey, the people met, experiences, learning, just being within the creative process.”

She says there is still a lot to be done mainly in figuring out how to continue to share her work in more innovative ways. “Basically my career is, I think, to just keep working and everything will follow along.”

By Clint Buehler

For Bertha Clark Jones, contributing is not just something she does, it has always been her way of life.

And that way of life and the contributions that resulted from it have now been recognized by her own people. At a gala event in Edmonton in March she will receive the National Aboriginal Achievement Foundation’s 2007 Lifetime Achievement Award.
The way of life she has chosen certainly hasn’t always been easy.

Growing up isolated in northern Alberta, one of 14 children, she knows first-hand the hardships of struggling to survive during the Great Depression.

But that experience also gave her the will and determination to not only survive, but to take on great challenges. And she credits her parents and grandparents for the lessons learned from their example.

“They were so traditional and honest and hardworking. . There were 14 of us to raise in some of the hardest times.”
She grew up strong, her excellence as an athlete and her success in sports—despite often having to face daunting odds and historical prejudice—giving her a foundation of confidence that she could build on. “I would have liked to become a nurse, but I also loved sports and if I didn’t do what I had done, I would have promoted sports and encouraged youth to get involved.”
What she did instead took her down several different paths.
Service in the Royal Canadian Air Force during the Second World War brought its own challenges and lessons, and led to her lifetime interest in, and support for, the fair treatment of Aboriginal veterans.

Always a champion of the underdog, even as a child she would stand up for anyone she felt was being unfairly treated. And that was particularly true of Native people—and especially Native women.

With the rise of numerous pro-active initiatives on behalf of Native people in the 1960s and 1970s, Bertha turned her attention to the plight of Native women, marginalized both in the mainstream and, sometimes, within their own communities In response, she was a co-founder of the Voice of Alberta Women (VANW) to represent the interest of all Native women.
That presented an interesting challenge because Native women were divided by status: There were those women who were Status Indians themselves, or whose mothers were Status Indians, and had lost their Indian Status by marrying men who were not Status Indians and were striving to regain their Status.. Then there were Metis women like Bertha, and “Non-Status” Indian women who had no viable argument for gaining Indian Status, but still needed the support of the organization to challenge the systemic marginalization and the lack of resources and opportunity they faced.

Bertha was one of those who helped to maintain the delicate balance that enabled the VANW to effectively represent both groups of women, even when Bill C-31 was passed to give the first group of women a vehicle for regaining their Indian Status.
It was that success in Alberta that led to the formation of the Native Women’s Association of Canada, with Bertha as its co-founder and first president, which immediately became a powerful voice for Native women in this country.

She may now say that she is “retired,” but she continues to be active in many ways, continuing to recognize, respect, promote, defend and enhance Native ancestral laws, spiritual beliefs, language and traditions.

Her current concern is education. “We need to keep our young people in school. I never really had an education, but nowadays you have to have one to fit into society.”

On a more personal note, “I love to garden and look after my plants. In the winter I still shovel my walk and I read a lot and just putter around the house. “ That reading currently includes the biography of another National .Aboriginal Achievement Award recipient, Dr. Herb Belcourt: “Walking in the Woods: A Metis Journey.”

Favourite artist? “I used to love Wilf Carter, the yodeling cowboy.”

Late nights of early riser? “Both. I can stay up late and sleep in, or wake up early. But in the past I’ve always been an early riser.”

Favourite place to travel in the world? “I like Australia; I wish I could go back there. It was beautiful and the people were so friendly.”

The best advice you ever received? “My older brother cared for us and he alwaysaid to us, ‘Be a lady.’ I thought of it many times even though I wasn’t a lot of the time I thought about it. I guess it means don’t be foolish, have respect for yourself and others.”

By Morgan O’Neal

Meanwhile the Vancouver Sun recently reported that one of the women missing from the Downtown Eastside had turned up alive. Lucky for her, and her family. This report followed directly upon a long human interest story in the Week-end Sun about the toils and troubles of the Vancouver Police Force Missing Person’s Squad. The story on the Squad emphasized the successes as opposed to the negative coverage it had received over recent years due to the botched investigation into the Downtown Eastside Missing Women. This negative perception was further exacerbated by the steadily increasing number of young women going missing in Northern British Columbia along the now infamous Highway of Tears.

The Vancouver Police Department’s missing persons unit was rightly criticized in the 1990s for its response to sex-trade workers vanishing from the Downtown Eastside. The list finally grew to as high as 69 women who vanished between 1978 and 2001. Port Coquitlam pig farmer Robert (Willie) Pickton has since been charged with killing 26 of those women, but even this upcoming trial threatens to degenerate into sensationalism and even perhaps mistrial, not to mention the huge legal costs of defending the accused.

Two years ago The Vancouver Sun obtained a scathing internal audit of the Missing Persons Unit, written in October 2004, which found that understaffing, inadequate supervision and shoddy record-keeping compromised the ability of the squad to solve cases. There was criticism of the leadership provided by the former head of the unit who was suspended in April 2005.
No great surprise then that the unit has been trying to improve its relationship with other police departments and agencies, such as search and rescue outfits, so they can better work together. And the B.C. Missing Persons Centre has been created by Mounties and municipal police to write new policy for missing persons investigations. Perhaps these changes will bear fruit in future investigations, but the damage has already been done in terms of the Highway of Tears. The more time that goes by without any charges being laid, the less chance there is that anyone will ever be convicted of these heinous crimes.

The Missing Persons Unit responded to criticism by developing new policies to deal with chronic run-away youths – who represented almost 95 per cent of missing person reports — and is apparently now working more efficiently with group homes, the Ministry for Children and Families, and other caregivers. Between August 2005 and August 2006 the unit recorded a 23 % drop in missing person reports, which is attributed to the changes in handling runaways. Or perhaps people just don’t bother to report anymore, expecting the worst.
Kate Gibson, executive director of the WISH (Women’s Information Safe Haven) drop-in centre for sex-trade workers in the Downtown Eastside, said the department’s efforts to improve the unit should be commended. A spokesperson for the Missing Women Task Force said all the sex-trade workers who have recently disappeared from Vancouver have been found, and that there are no outstanding files with the VPD. And the force is quick to point out that the unit doesn’t categorize missing people according to occupations. “Whether she’s from here [the Downtown Eastside] or from the West End of Vancouver, everyone gets the same treatment,” added a 20-year VPD veteran. “We don’t pick and choose who we look for.” This statement is of course a baldfaced lie.

All these recent seemingly unrelated news stories in the mainstream media bring into focus a fundamental fact of Canadian life. Systemic racism is alive and well in this country, and everywhere one looks the victims of this racism are without support. As Ernie Crey, long time activist and brother of one of the women missing from the Vancouver Downtown Eastside now linked to the Picton trial, states, “We cannot pretend that police are equally responsive to different parts of society.” This is a very polite diplomatic way of describing systemic racism. The upcoming trial of Robert ‘Willy’ Picton has put those disappearances again in the public eye. Last month a jury of 12 and two alternates was chosen from 600 potential jurors. A media frenzy ensued, and the real possibility exists for a mistrial if too many of those selected turn out to be unable to stick it out for the year the trial is expected to last. The danger as always is that the sensational nature of the trial will suck up all the energy available for action and the victims and their families will be ignored and forgotten.

Let’s put this all into context. The former head of the Vancouver Police department’s Missing Persons unit, now-retired Sgt. John Dragani, was suspended in April 2005 and has since been charged with one count of possessing child pornography and one count of accessing child pornography. In October of last year an RCMP disciplinary board stopped proceedings against Constable Justin Harris, a police officer accused of sexual misconduct with three teenage prostitutes in Prince George. It stopped them because the incompetent police force failed to investigate complaints against Harris within a one-year time limit, as required by the RCMP Act. Under that Act, a commanding officer has to launch a disciplinary hearing within a year of being notified of an allegation against an officer. Harris, accused of buying sex from teenage prostitutes in Prince George between 1993 and 2001, maintains the allegations are false. He remains suspended with pay while the Mounties in B.C. send their appeal request to the force’s headquarters in Ottawa.
Constable Harris was accused of his misconduct shortly after former Prince George judge David William Ramsay, 63, was sentenced to seven years in jail for sexual attacks on young girls who had appeared before him in court in Prince George between 1992 and 2001. Ramsay was removed from the bench in July 2002, and later resigned. In 2004 he pleaded guilty to multipkle charges including: breach of trust, sexual assault causing bodily harm, and buying sex from minors. His victims were four girls, three of them aboriginal, who ranged in age from 12 to 16. The judge who sentenced Ramsay called his crimes “utterly reprehensible.” Ramsay is now serving his sentence at a prison in Atlantic Canada. He recently became eligible to apply for day parole, but didn’t. He will soon become eligible for full parole.
If these facts do not imply systemic racism I don’t know what does. Barb Mallett, a social worker who helps prostitutes get off the streets, said these kinds of cases make it appear as if there is no justice for sex trade workers who make complaints. “It doesn’t give Prince George a good image. It’s as if things are just brushed under the carpet and not taken seriously,” she said. And Aboriginal leader and lawyer Bill Wilson, who had called for a 25-year sentence for Ramsay, said that the former judge “should never, ever get out of there. He should do 25 years and die there. There’s no redemption.” Annabelle Webb, who speaks for the advocacy group Justice for Girls, agrees with Wilson. “The breach of trust in the crimes he committed was huge, and I think he’s a danger to young women in the community.” Parole officials said if Ramsay didn’t get parole, he will likely leave prison under statutory release in 2009.

No wonder, therefore, that Hedy Fry, Minister for Multiculturalism in the former Liberal government rose in federal parliament as long ago as 2001 to mark anti-racism day, and after referring to hate venues such as Kosovo and Northern Ireland, isolated Prince George, British Columbia, as another example. People were outraged that ethnic cleansing in Kosovo and sectarian bombs and killings in Northern Ireland would be compared to the problems of a sleepy northern town like Prince George just because of a few daytime cross burnings and the seething racial hatred this implies. But Fry’s comments were obviously valid. The mindset that allows an underlying problem of poverty and marginalization to persist in a country as wealthy as Canada is the same that remains silent in the face of the recent revelations that Tony Merchant’s law firm stands to make 40 million dollars for its part in reaching a compensation settlement for victims of Residential School abuse.

Retired Supreme Court Judge Frank Iacobucci, appointed in June 2005 to negotiate a settlement for aboriginal residential school students with the government and the various churches involved, was paid up to $200,000 per month, plus expenses, for his work. The money (2.5 million dollars in total) was for his expertise and the assistance of two junior lawyers in his office, according to documents obtained by CBC News. Another team of lawyers led by Tony Merchant has been promised between $25 million and $40 million under the terms of the settlement for its work. Acccording to Merchant, his firm spent 10 years on cases and had more than 100 lawyers working on them. He was surprised by the amount paid to Iacobucci. The rate is more than the “standard” range Ottawa pays, according to the documents. A lawyer with more than 20 years experience is normally paid between $150 and $200 an hour. And now Justice Iacobucci apparently has questions about the amount of money Tony Merchant is going to get.

So while the legal beagles argue about who is the biggest shyster and recipient of ‘misery money’, an estimated 100,000 aboriginal children traumatized by the system of Indian Residential Schools from 1930 to 1996 (Statistics Canada estimates 80,000 are still alive today) wait to receive a pittance for their suffering. Many suffered physical and sexual abuse while there. For more than a decade, former students pursued lawsuits against Ottawa and churches for damages relating to their experiences. But litigation was slow and only a handful of cases were settled until the former federal Liberal government appointed Iacobucci in 2005 to help reach a compensation package. Part of his job was also to study the creation of a national truth-and-reconciliation forum to give survivors a chance to tell their stories.

In February 2006, the Drum ran a story of its own, “Residential School Survivor Willy Blackwater Speaks Out,” in which Blackwater, the original claimant who pioneered litigation, spoke out against the deal offering any former student a lump sum of $10,000 each, plus $3,000 for each year spent in the schools. As Blackwater put it, “The only ones that benefit from these atrocities are the lawyers, the legal firms.” The revelations about the amount of money being paid to Iacobucci and Merchant only re-affirm the sad fact that White society can always find a way to benefit itself despite the fact that its representatives are at fault in the first place. Merchant will be able to buy himself a fleet of SUV’s.

Issues ranging from land claims and housing shortages to contaminated water remain on agendas as aboriginal leaders meet with government representatives in summit after summit, but the same basic problems continue to plague Aboriginal communities. The housing shortage on reserves across the country is estimated at between 20,000 and 35,000 units. As Phil Fontaine, national chief of the Assembly of First Nations put it, “Canada has a Third World in its front yard and back alleys. That is a national tragedy and an international embarrassment”

The recently released National Film Board documentary film “Finding Dawn” by Christine Welsh is, according to its Director, meant to illustrate the deep historically social and economic factors that contribute to the epidemic of violence against Native women in Canada. The women murdered and missing from the Downtown Eastside and the Highway of Tears since 1974 are only the most obvious examples of this epidemic.

In 2006, more or less 33 years after the first woman disappeared in Northern British Columbia, an Amnesty International report estimated on the basis of logical linkages between various police files that at least 33 women have been murdered or have gone missing in the area traveled by the Highway of Tears. After much delay and denial by the authorities the 2005 Symposium organized to try to breathe life into the investigation and soothe the grieving families of the victims came up with 33 recommendations for focus: 15 on victim prevention, 6 on emergency planning, 6 on family counseling, and 6 on community development.

“It’s a lot more than teaching people about the perils of hitchhiking,” said Lisa Krebs. “It’s about social change. There are reasons they are standing out on the highway.” Yes, it is, and everyone knows the reasons that these young women stand on the highway watching the minivans and SUV’s speed by. They are historical social and economic, the consequences of systematic exploitation and oppression at the hands of government authorities, corporations and lawyers over the years. And the $10,000 offered to each victim of Residential School abuse will not even begin to buy that victim a mini van or an SUV so he or she can join the parade of blissful ignorance on the Highway of Flying Rocks on Vancouver Island. This all has the familiar ring or scratchy sound of a broken record going round and round at 33 and 1/3 RPM’s.

By Morgan O’Neal

As the trial of the man accused in the multiple murders and disappearances of women from the infamous Downtown Eastside of Vancouver began in New Westminter last month, attracting like flies to a corpse spectators and journalists from as far away as Europe, a relatively small Winnipeg construction pledged financial aid to shed light upon a lesser known tragedy unfolding in Manitoba. It is believed that there are now more than 50 women who have been murdered or have gone missing in the province in recent years. These cases all remain unsolved and almost all of them involve female aboriginal victims.

Jerry Sorokowski, head of PMG Inc. (a firm that does most of its work on reserves in the North) has pledged to contribute $1,000 from every home it builds to a fund meant to focus attention on a problem that has haunted people for years. Rumours have long circulated and many people have known about these cases since the beginning, but the deaths and disappearances have remained under reported in the media and moribund in the files of the police. If these facts seem vaguely familiar it is perhaps because this is precisely what happened in the initial stages of the investigation into the women who went missing on the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver.

For years, the Vaancouver police refused to take seriously the statements of people who suggested that a killer was on the loose and was preying on women in this area of the city. “I’ve never been touched by this kind of tragedy and I can’t imagine what it’s like to be in a family whose daughter has gone missing or has been murdered,” Sorokowski said. There are, of course, no shortage of grieving relatives in British Columbia who can tell him exactly what it is like to be in such a family, and to be ignored by a police force and a justice system supposedly designed to serve and protect people in such circumstances.
We can only hope and pray that the same mistakes will not continue to be made in Manitoba that so disgraced the police work in British Columbia and brought such disappointment upon the families of degraded victims. It should not, after all, fall to Sorokowski’s construction company (which will build about 50 homes on northern reserves this season) to fund investigation into these unsolved crimes. But as long as it does, and in the absence of government intervention, we can only applaud this lone ranger for his noble effort. When the homes are built and the math is done it is expected that a total of $50,000 will be raised toward the Reward Fund.
The fund, known as Sisters in Spirit, Winnipeg Chapter, was originally the brainchild of Raven ThunderSky, whose sister Barbara Keam was murdered in 1980 in Norway House. Her’s is one of the slayings that has never been solved. Raven ThunderSky has known Sorokowski for many years, but could hardly believe her ears when she heard that he was kick-starting the reward fund with such a large contribution. “I told Jerry I had this impossible dream to start a reward fund and when he said he’d give $1,000 for every home I didn’t think I heard him properly,” ThunderSky said.

Meanwhile, Sorokowski said he’s hopeful that other firms that do business with First Nations communities, and those that don’t, will contribute to the reward fund. The group’s lawyer is now in the process of setting up the fund, and ThunderSky invites any individual or firm wanting to donate to the cause to contact her through her e-mail: raventhundersky@hotmail.com

By Morgan O’Neal

There is no shortage of poetry in circulation nowadays, and one gets tired of being dragged into the internal banalities of so-called poets who assume that every word they write is worthy of the paper its written on. But Sharron Proulx-Turner distinguishes herself from the run of the mill in her “caustic and powerful creation poem,” what the auntys say. The poet sings the “old lady” into being in language and rhythm, and the ‘old lady’ sings the world into being in dust and grass. “Retold by the auntys of the title, what the auntys say is serial poetry with wit as dry and humour as rich as the land that bred it. Stirring magic into the mundane, Sharron Proulx-Turner bleeds elegy through the colloquial, fusing history, soil and Alberta farmland into a dense, fluid neo-epic. Language soars.”

In the case of this book, the advertising blurb is true to its word. What the auntys say is a real achievement, and as “the culmination of years of rumination on roots and the power of language” it does Proulx-Turner’s Metis heritage proud. Shortlisted for the 2003 Gerald Lampert Memorial Award for Poetry, in both form and content, this book is a joy to behold, a densely packaged gift of knowledge offered up in the spirit of ancestral wisdom. There is as much truth in a recipe for bannock discreetly interwoven with social critique of the colonial past as there is in any patronizing commonplace delivered from the pulpit or the lecturn of a pedagogue. In the opinion of the Gerald Lampert Memorial Award Judges, the book “is beautiful in its forms and whole, drives out fear, is full of elation and vigour, funny, smart and gentle, with a lovely use of refrains and a historical consciousness. The old lady trickster is wonderful.”
Although there is no shortage of shocking imagery, each traumatic figure is tempered by the generosity and humor of the literate voice which utters the violence. The poet’s eye is always a critical one: “And out pops the old lady / body raining flying fills the breeze / picks up that paleskinned blueyed baby / how can anyone hate a baby is what goes through her head / this is just after she sees them folks in whitetown / put that baby in a vice / and squeeze” (Part iiii, Many mother-tongued and too big for that one, “Full-winged and awed to cheechauk” 101). The old lady gets her knowledge from the same source we are expected to discover it, language. She reads the messages left for her in the notes of random event and encounter: “a note the old lady finds frozen in hail the size of a goose egg [knowledge of the natural world] . . . a note the old lady finds frozen in hail the size of georges erasmus [the teachings of the elders]” (Part iii, You must break them apart until the children are read, “Rinsing off the whites of eggs” 93).

This knowledge, this wisdom Proulx-Turner turns over to us when we read her poetry, is truly a gift, for we come away somehow very much richer for the effort and experience of reading. Each word, phrase, line, verse, poem, is an intimate note left just for us, “frozen in hail the size of maria campbell” (75), the size of Sharron Proulx-Turner. For as a poet she has earned herself the office of elder and teacher. She has earned the title not because she holds a Master’s Degree in English from the University of Calgary where she has taught at Old Sun and Mount Royal Colleges, but because she has produced a book of poetry that speaks from the heart directly to the Metis Nation and beyond.

By Lloyd Dolha

A senate report is recommending the establishment of an independent specific claims body with an annual budget of $250 million to address a significant backlog of specific claims among First Nations across Canada.

Invoking the violent images of Oka, Caledonia, blockades and police action, the Senate Standing Committee on Aboriginal Peoples has warned the federal government in their recently released report Negotiation or Confrontation: It’s Canada’s Choice, that government must move quickly to address the legitimate specific claims grievances of First Nations.
“Inaction or maintaining the status quo is not acceptable. It’s breeding violence,” said Metis senator Gerry St. Germaine, chair of the committee. “The First Nations of Canada have been incredibly patient, some of them have waited three and four decades for the resolution of their claims,” said St. Germaine. He warned of a summer of confrontation and police action if something is not done.

Tabled in the senate in December 2006, the report was released following a year of hearings from a wide range of First Nations leaders and academics. It states that a plan to settle the outstanding claims is a proven way to better the lives of aboriginal peoples in the communities. Resolving land disputes, the committee argues, allows First Nations to benefit from economic activities such as housing developments and natural resource projects.

“In every case where they have been settled, it has meant an immediate improvement in the lives of First Nations peoples,” says the report.

The report lays out a specific set of guidelines on how to remediate the government’s specific claims policy and process in ways that will address past wrongs that were committed against First Nations by officials of the federal government which have included fraud and outright theft.

In the next federal budget, the committee wants to see:
• An increase in funds available for settlement. No less than $250 million per year to be allocated to a fund for the payment of specific claims settlements.
•The establishment of an independent claims resolution body within two years. This body would be established in full partnership with First Nations and be capable of reaching settlements in five years of their submission to the body: and,
• The adoption of new guiding principles of fairness, inclusion, dialogue and recognition of regional differences.
Of the roughly 1,300 specific claims submitted by some 400 First Nations since the inception of the policy in 1970, approximately 900 have yet to be resolved.
The report found that long delays and Ottawa’s conflict of interest in acting as both defendant and judge, means it will be at least 90 years before the backlog of claims is resolved.
In an interview, Senator St. Germaine said federal leaders need to treat their legal liabilities in the same way a business would, setting aside enough money each year until the debt can be paid off.

The Metis senator estimated that settling all specific claims would cost between $3 and $6 billion. Even with the $250 million fund, it would take between 12 and 24 years to clear the backlog.

The senate report echoes the recommendations of the Assembly of First Nations, presented to the committee in November 2006.
“In order for First Nations to move from poverty to prosperity, Canada must settle its lawful obligations owed to First Nations,” said AFN national chief Phil Fontaine. “I’m pleased that Minister Prentice has indicated that he looks to the Senate report for its recommendations on how to improve the process.

Prentice has pledged to reform the way Ottawa deals with land claims, but has yet to announce his new approach. He spent most of his career dealing with land claims.

By Morgan O’Neal

On Saturday, January 27, Akina Shirt, a 13-year-old Alberta girl made history at center ice in Calgary’s Saddledome. In front of hundreds of thousands of Hockey Night in Canada viewers all across the country, the Aboriginal teenager became the first person to ever sing O Canada in the Cree language at a National Hockey League game. She sang to a sold-out crowd in the Saddledome to begin a game which the Calgary Flames eventually went on to win over the Vancouver Canucks 4-3.

Shirt had already gained a local reputation as a lucky charm since she started out singing the anthem in English for the Saddle Lake Junior B Warriors. Every time she has opened a game, the home team has won. Saturday night was the first time she has opened for a professional hockey game.

Akina Shirt, who lives in Edmonton but is originally from the Saddle Lake First Nation about 120 kilometres east of the Alberta capitol, learned the Cree version of the anthem a year ago. “I had to work extra hard in learning the words and practising it and I eventually memorized it and it just comes natural,” she told reporters. The performance was apparently facilitated by the chief of the Saddle Lake First Nation who told the Flames’ front office that they should have her sing the anthem.

What is most important about this obviously newsworthy event though, is that it brings to light the ongoing problem of the slow agonizing death of Indigenous languages in Canada. Although a single performance of the national anthem in Cree will not revive the many Native languages on the verge of disappearance, the inspiring spectacle of a young Aboriginal singer expressing pride in her culture should remind Canadian citizens of all backgrounds that these languages are worth saving.

The fact is that Akina Shirt’s musical effort should only be a beginning. The national anthem should be translated into every available Native tongue and performed at sports events all over this country, at every opportunity. Her brave and triumphant initiative should go down in history as the first of many such performances in the future.

By B.H. Bates

Everyone talks about the weather, but no one does anything about it. Global warming, hot summers, no snow and an Elder recently told me we’re going to have an early spring. Wondering whether or not I can depend on the word of a modern day climatologist, an Elders hot air or the flip of a coin: “The answer my friend, is blowing in the wind!”
My lady love and I live in a wonderful, peaceful valley in British Columbia. The Great Spirit knew what he (or she) was doing when he (or she) created this part of the World; long hot summers, short winters with the usual three to five centimeters of snow, just in time for the holidays. The spring weather awakens beautiful yellow flowers as the days grow longer. And Autumns in the Okanagan valley… well, what can I say? I think the Great Spirit got the idea for ‘Indian Summer’ right here in paradise.
I shouldn’t be telling everyone about this place, because sooner or later every Tom O’Conner, Dick Minsky and Harry Krishna will come here and shack-up with a Native lady, or Bro, and move onto the local Rez. But, what the hell! My guess and hope is: only the smart ones will figure out the secret.
Comparing the rest of the World to this neck of the woods; North America has a fairly stabile economy, we don’t have land-mines planted in the north forty, but, only in Canada, eh – do we have as many beavers, per-capita, as the United States has guns. Looking closer at the great white (and red) north country: on the east coast, they have the ‘nor-westerners’ coming off the chilly Atlantic ocean. Moving west, young man: unless you speak French, you may as well keep on trucking. Then comes the prairies … well Bro, they’re as featureless and as flat as the chest of a pre- pubescent girl.
Alberta, the gateway to beautiful B. C. (Best Country). Now, don’t get me wrong, Alberta’s not all that bad – except the weather can turn from nice to nasty faster than a menopausal woman! And not to say that good old B. C., Isn’t without it’s faults. Up north can get pretty damn cold and on the ‘wet’ coast (Vancouver and the island), you don’t tan, you rust!
Now, finally to the OK (Okanagan) valley … well my (Native) brothers and sisters: “This land was made for you and me!” The valley is protected by the coastal mountain range from the Pacific storms. We do get some rain, but it only falls between 3:00 AM and 6:00 AM. The sun is just a little warmer, there are more stars in the night sky and folks here are as friendly as a politician around election time.
… And now, back to the ‘weather.’ Can an Elder really tell the future? A long time ago when the Earth was green – the Elders were the ones to whom we turned when we wanted to know whether or not it was a good day to have a ‘potlatch’ (picnic, to our non-native readers). They looked to nature for the answers; Red sky at night: Injun, can sleep outside tonight. Red sky in morn: Injun sleep in Wigwam.
Another respected Elder (my Mom, Phyllis Bates) told me she could feel a change in the weather in her ol’ bones. And it’s been a proven fact, that it is possible to detect atmospheric changes in your general health; hair can get frizzy, eyes can become dry and itchy, everything from congestion to erections. The weather can even change a person’s moods, it can make us feel happy and active to sad and depressed.
The ‘Old ones,’ knew of these things; they made rock circles and observed the seasonal equinoxes, watched the sun’s rise and fall on the horizon, and even the movement of the animals told the ancient ones what to expect in the near future. And many thought that the Druids, with their Stone Henge, were the first ones to cast light on a forecast?
One old Elder told me he had a cat that could tell him the weather … Yes, a cat? He said he’d take the cat to the back of the house and then throw the cat out the window, then he’d go to the front door and let the cat back in; if the cat was wet, he knew it was raining. If the cat tracked in snow he knew it was winter and if the cat didn’t come back – he knew he needed a new cat.

THE END

Dear reader: Please feel free to contact, B. H. Bates at: ebeinthebonnet@shaw.ca

By Morgan O’Neal

On Wednesday, February 14, the 16th Annual Women’s Memorial March, honoring and remembering the lives of the 29 murdered women and the 36 women still missing from the Downtown Eastside of Vancouver, drew hundreds of supporters to the Carnegie Community Center at the corner of Main and Hastings. Under the banner “Their Spirits Live Within Us” the event is yearly organized “by Women and led by Women because Women, especially Aboriginal Women, face physical, mental, emotional and spiritual violence on a daily basis.” This event has become extremely important to the grieving families of the many victims because it offers individuals a chance to express not only their sadness at the deaths or disappearances of loved ones, but also because it has become a forum for expressing frustration about the manner in which the authorities responded to the initial problem.

These frustrations take at least two different forms; the first is the ineffectiveness of the initial investigation and the fact that it took the police so long to get their act together. The second and no less serious problem is the fact that the word on the street is that id Pickton is guilty of these horrendous crimes he certainly did not act alone. The consequences of ignoring this grassroots information is that persons involved in the disappearances and murders on the Downtown Eastside continue to walk free and present a threat to other women in the area. Members of the victims’ families and people who knew and worked with some of the murdered women have long been aware that there are other people involved in this heinous crime.

women’s march 2

The Memorial March took place as the trial of Robert ‘Willy’ Picton went into its second month in a New Westminster Courthouse. The B.C. Supreme Court jury has already seen more than 20 hours of video filmed secretly after Pickton’s arrest. A profile of the man accused of the worst serial murder in Canadian history is beginning to emerge in the testimony of investigators involved in the case. But it was also revealed that three other people besides Pickton were arrested in connection with the murders of Vancouver’s missing women, the lead investigator in the case testified Monday. None were charged with any of the murders.

The information came out at the start of the second week of Pickton’s first-degree murder trial for the deaths of six women in New Westminster, B.C., during defence lawyer Peter Ritchie’s cross-examination of Insp. Don Adam, the RCMP officer in charge of the investigation. Lynn Ellingsen and Dinah Taylor were arrested more than a week before Pickton was arrested in February 2002, Adam said. But he said Ellingsen’s connection was “resolved” after an interview with police. Adam told the court there was an extensive and thorough investigation into Taylor and Pat Casanova, who was arrested almost a year later in January 2003.

The jury has viewed the RCMP’s videotaped interrogation of Pickton, in which Casanova is described as Pickton’s friend and police allege Ellingsen was blackmailing Pickton. The jury has heard Ellingsen will testify against Pickton. Casanova will also testify during the trial. .Criminal lawyer Donna Turko told CBC News that Pickton’s defence lawyer will want to keep asking questions about other possible suspects in this case. “It’s absolutely essential for the defence, at the earliest time possible, to put in front of the jury the possibility that other persons may be responsible for this crime,” Turko said Monday. “I think the public and everyone has been wondering, was Mr. Pickton capable of these murders? Was he assisted by somebody, or was he actually an accessory after the fact?”

Earlier in his testimony, Adam told the murder trial that Pickton was a person of interest in the disappearance of women from Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside, and plans were underway to search his suburban pig farm before his arrest five years ago. He said police were preparing to get a search warrant when Pickton was arrested and released on an unrelated firearms charge. Two weeks later, Pickton was arrested again and charged with the alleged murders of two missing women. He was eventually charged with 26 counts of first-degree murder. In the current trial, which began Jan. 22 in B.C. Supreme Court, he is being tried for six counts of first-degree murder.

Adam also told the jury that the investigation is not over, and, in fact, has become even larger because evidence turned up in this case has led police to other unsolved homicides. “This is the largest, most expensive search that has been done in Canadian policing.” Adam said more than 400,000 swabs of DNA were taken as evidence by the team of investigators. He also said bulldozers were called in to dig up the property, and 383,000 cubic yards (292,825 cubic metres) of soil were sifted for human remains.He also noted that the investigation used up the entire supply of white contamination suits in Canada.

In speeches leading up to the march, more than one speaker made reference to the fact that Pickton did not act alone. And speaker after speaker referred to the huge outpouring of emotional and financial support from all quarters in response to the recent devastation of Stanley Park by monster winds. Politicians from all levels of government flocked to the park in order to be photographed among the toppled trees, and pledge fund to begin cleaning up the mess and rebuilding. Where were these representatives of government when the Memorial March was held? Not one was in attendance. Sam Sullivan wheeled himself around the park a number of times, but he never showed up at the Carnegie Center. It is wheelchair accessible, after all. Compare this civic outcry for the fate of the urban forest to the pathetic lack of response to the initial reports of the women going missing in the Downtown Eastside.

In any case the hundreds of supporters of the victims and their families gathered at Carnegie center listened to emotional speakers representing various organizations and agencies involved in helping the families of both the victims of the Downtown Eastside and the Highway of Tears. As the gathering drew to a close, Assembly of First Nations Chief, Phil Fontaine arrived to offer his support and to walk with the crowd assembled. Also, the First Nations Women Chiefs and Councillors, who had been meeting at a forum in Vancouver since February 12 to express their “overwhelming concern and frustration with the current situation facing First Nations communities,” distributed copies of the Consensus Statement produced at their meeting.

When the speeches were completed, the march itself began more or less right on time. People grabbed their umbrellas and left the building to assemble in the intersection of Main and Hastings, and for a moment or two it was difficult to distinguish between the dealers of prescription drugs on the street corner and the marchers milling on the outskirts of the crowd. The police had already arrived to facilitate the rally and to direct downtown traffic. The banners were unfurled and the marchers moved west down Hastings under as many umbrellas as could be mustered, unconcerned with the inclement weather, for all minds were as one even in the pouring rain. The reason they were walking; to remember the women who were dead and missing.