Cities, their institutions, agencies and corporations benefiting with First Nations moving off the land
Historic government efforts to make it impossible for Aboriginal people to live and prosper in their own communities seems to be working with the migration of people relocating to urban environments to access services and "opportunities".
Examples of the urban strategy for taking care of themselves on the backs of remote and rural communities ...
- Underfunding of First Nation infrastructure and programs;
- legislation supporting corporate rape of traditional lands;
- legal systems that fill the courts and the corrections institutions with Aboriginal people;
- educational funding for urban institutions that only teach how to survive as non-native people in urban centres;
- social agencies that depend on poverty so they can exist;
- election system that only favours large population centres;
- medical and health services located in huge institutions that force people to move to them;
- ... and the list goes on
Natives feeling the pull of major urban centres
Joanna Smith - Staff Reporter - Jan 16, 2008
Census figures show that about half of all Canadian native people lived off reserves in 2006, preferring cities including Toronto, where this photo was taken at the First Nations public school on Dundas St. E.
Alice Louttit does not say much, but she smiles a lot while showing off her new home.
The 51-year-old woman was the first native person to move into Zhaawnong Gamik ("South House"), a new affordable housing complex on Church St. run by Nishnawbe Homes Inc.
The non-profit organization, which provides safe housing for the growing aboriginal community in Toronto, hopes to finish renovating the 19th century building by the end of February and fill the rest of its 60 units with students, elders and the working poor from the native community.
The need for such housing and other services in Toronto was highlighted yesterday by the latest Census 2006 release, which shows Canada's native population has grown by 45 per cent to 1.2 million in the past decade.
The data also showed 54 per cent of the native population now lives in or near cities, up from 50 per cent in 1996, although the number of native people living on reserves has actually increased by 2 per cent. The native population in Toronto has grown to 26,575 people, a 30.9 per cent increase from 1996.
Frances Sanderson, executive director of Nishnawbe Homes, said aboriginal people are coming to cities to find opportunities not available on the reserves and in rural areas, a phenomenon she notes is not unique to the native community.
"Toronto is the apex, I would think, of opportunity for everybody. That's not just why aboriginal people are coming here. That's why the world is coming here," she said.
Sanderson is not the only community worker who has been feeling the crunch.
"We've always known that our population has been increasing," said Kimberly Murray, executive director of Aboriginal Legal Services of Toronto. "We can feel it in our services and the strain on our services."
Sanderson said finding affordable housing is a big challenge for aboriginal people in Toronto, a subject community leaders and politicians will tackle at a summit to be held at City Hall next week.
Sanderson said tenants at Zhaawnong Gamik will pay $500 to live in furnished units in the building, which is near schools and public transit.
The building has 24-hour reception to keep unwanted visitors away, something that helps Louttit feel far safer than she did when she lived in a transitional home for native women and an affordable housing complex for native families.
"I didn't feel safe there at all," said Louttit, who moved to the city about 30 years ago from Moose Factory Island, just south of James Bay. "There was lots of drugs and drinking and partying going on."
Sanderson said connecting to social services, recreational activities and education is another challenge Zhaawnong Gamik hopes to help its tenants overcome with a support worker on staff and programming such as Ojibwa language classes.
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First Nations’ spending plays big role in local economy: study New group in process of investing
By Duane Hicks, January 16, 2008
FORT FRANCES—A economic impact study commissioned last year shows that spending by the seven area First Nations is a major economic driver in Rainy River District, and what’s good for the First Nations is good for everyone else.
In an interview Friday, Tony Marinaro, economic development advisor for Pwi-Di-Goo-Zing Ne-Yaa-Zhing Advisory Services, said the study notes the area’s First Nation communities make up about 10 percent of the total population, yet band members and businesses contributed almost $62 million to the $530 million local economy in 2006.
“If the First Nations’ economy were considered a separate sector in the Rainy River District census area, it would rank just below the forest sector,” said Marinaro.
“In fact, the seven First Nations, in terms of population, employment, and economic impact, is in all probability, the second-most important sector in the Rainy River District census area,” he stressed, citing the impact study which was conducted by Jack Carr, a professor of economics at the University of Toronto.
“Carr also noted that increased spending as a result of land claim settlements, for example, could almost triple that amount in the future,” Marinaro added.
“However, that was not calculated in this study.”
The study indicated a total of 75 percent of First Nations’ spending stays within the local economy. It also noted First Nations’ residents spend about 60-70 percent of their income on consumption goods.
Aboriginal workers represent about eight percent of the total workforce in the district, and the study found a disparity between native and non-native income levels.
The average non-native household income in the Rainy River District census area was $61,000 a year—compared to less than $32,000 for the average native household.
“Any policies or efforts which lead to an improvement in the average income in the seven First Nations would, in the first instance, improve the lives of the members in the First Nations,” the study concluded.
“However, because the First Nations represent such a significant share of the local economy, any increase in the standard of living would be a spillover effect and improve the standard of living in the entire district,” it added.
“When you’re spending 75 percent of your income in the area, it’s in everyone’s interest to have a growing and prosperous First Nations’ community,” Marinaro remarked.
Naicatchewenin chief Wayne Smith, who also holds the portfolio for economic development for area First Nations, said aboriginal leaders have been looking to commission an economic impact study for years, yet this is the first of its kind.
“I think we always had a rough idea of the amount of money spent within the economy, but we never really knew how much. We knew it was quite a bit,” said Chief Smith.
“It wasn’t a surprise, but at the same time it was, once you see it on paper,” he added.
“It was staggering even to us,” echoed Marinaro. “We had a good idea there was a fair amount of money we put into the economy, but when you actually get the figures. . . .”
Marinaro noted the study was first presented to area First Nations’ leaders at an economic development strategic planning session last year.
Following that, they met with Robert Campbell, vice-president of the Tribal Councils Investment Group (TCIG) of Manitoba, and were inspired by the tremendous success of that corporation to find a means to recover the money area First Nations have been spending.
“Basically, the leadership created an investment group. It’s called the Rainy Lake Tribal Development Corp.,” explained Marinaro. “The majority of the communities invested seed capital to build sustainable and profitable businesses.
“So, we’re going out and seeking and finding existing businesses to invest into, to form partnerships with,” he added. “We’re researching and developing those partnerships as we speak.
“We’ve been working on it for a number of months now, and in the next few months we should be prepared to start announcing some of the partnerships we’ve developed,” Marinaro noted.
“They’re quite interesting.”
These existing businesses could be located within the district, region, or even further afield, and need not be First Nations-based.
“We’re looking at investing outside our First Nation communities,” Marinaro said. “It’s an attempt to create wealth and employment through securing long-term strategic partnerships and investments.”
“Based on the study, as a collective, the First Nations’ communities have a lot of buying power and we are going to try and maximize that,” Chief Smith pledged.
“Right now, we spend that kind of money, but we’re not recouping much of those funds,” added Marinaro. “We’re a consumer nation, it seems, and we’re going to have to change that.
“So, we’re analyzing the areas in which we spend these funds, and by partnering with some of these businesses, there’s an opportunity to recoup some of them, to recapture some of them.
“And any employment that comes out of that is kind of a bonus because the intent is strictly to generate wealth.”
Marinaro said local First Nations are trying to keep in mind a long-term economic view.
“It would be very sad to see our major employers leave the area, God forbid that ever happen,” he remarked. “But if it does, who’s going to be left? The First Nations people will be here.
“We were here before, we were here during, we’ll be here after,” he stressed. “It’s only in our best interests to prepare ourselves for the future. And as it says in the study, it’s in everybody’s best interest if the First Nations do well.
“The more prosperous the First Nations are, the more spillover for the district,” added Marinaro.
The Rainy Lake Tribal Development Corp. has a board of directors consisting of representatives from the partner First Nations. The executive includes Couchiching Chief Chuck McPherson as president, Smith as vice-president, and Marcel Horton as secretary-treasurer.
Going by TCIG’s very successful example, Rainy Lake Tribal Development Corp.’s potential could be great.
In 1990, for instance, TCIG, representing 55 First Nations’ communities and more than 100,000 people, combined resources to establish themselves in the corporate business community, explained Marinaro.
Each tribal council made an initial investment of $25,000 to form TCIG and invest in opportunities that were beyond the financial capacity of the individual tribal councils or First Nations.
The combination of their resources resulted in a far greater impact within the corporate community, noted Marinaro, resulting in TCIG currently owning a group of 13 businesses ranging from the Radisson Hotel Winnipeg, Arctic Beverages Ltd. (Pepsi), and Paragon Pharmacies to Artis Real Estate Investment Trust, First Canadian Fuels Ltd., and First Canadian Water and Infrastructure Inc.
“It’s the kind of thing that shows it is possible to succeed,” said Marinaro. “It just takes the will—and the will is definitely there from the area.”
The Rainy Lake Tribal Development Corp. is a joint venture, clarified Marinaro, but partner communities will continue to act independently and pursue their own economic development opportunities.
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Aboriginal shift to cities spurred by desire to improve their lives - Young population means change is just beginning
Paula Simons, January 17, 2007
The numbers are striking, both for their sheer size and for their social consequences.
Data from the 2006 census released this week says 62 per cent of aboriginal Albertans live in big cities, rather than on reserves or Métis settlements.
Metro Edmonton is Alberta's aboriginal capital, with an estimated population of more than 52,000 as of two years ago when the census data was collected.
In the past five years, Edmonton's over-all population grew about 10 per cent. But our aboriginal population grew 27 per cent.
More and more people are giving up on the isolation and the social and economic hopelessness of traditional reserves and settlements. They're tired of the corruption and the incompetence, tired of unaccountable chiefs, tired of the paternalism of the Indian Act.
They're moving to Edmonton, as are so many other people because they're looking for jobs, educational opportunities, better health care and fresh chances for themselves and their children. But our native population boom is fuelled, too, by unique demographics. The baby boom in Canada's aboriginal community happened later than the baby boom in the general population. So the echo-boom, created when the boomers hit peak child-bearing age, happened later, too.
The aboriginal population also has a far higher birth rate, about 70 per cent greater than the general population. Part of that may be due to cultural or religious factors, but it may have more to do with poverty. Young women with few economic and educational choices are generally more likely to have more children, starting at a younger age.
That said, it's no surprise that the aboriginal population is far younger than the general population. The median age for Albertans in 2006 was 36. For the aboriginal population, the median age was 25, with half the population under 24. Here in Edmonton, almost half the aboriginal population was under 20, with the single largest cohort being children between the ages of 10 and 14.
Even though aboriginal people make up five per cent of Edmonton's population, aboriginal children make up almost 10 per cent of the primary school population in both the Edmonton public and Edmonton Catholic school systems.
That's a huge and growing challenge for cash-strapped school boards as they struggle to give these children, many of whom are growing up in poverty, an equal start in life.
But things for young aboriginals are not equal, not here.
In this province, aboriginal children make up 40 per cent of the child-welfare caseload. About 50 per cent of all children who are permanent wards of the province are aboriginal. So are 33 per cent of all youth remanded in legal custody.
An aboriginal child in this province is twice as likely to be physically or mentally handicapped than a non-aboriginal. And the latest available numbers from the province suggest the high school completion rate for native youth is a woeful eight per cent.
Do I want to depress you by repeating this sorrow litany of numbers? No. I want to inspire you.
We must seize this moment. We must invest, right now, in this generation of young Edmontonians or face cataclysmic social and economic consequences down the road.
We need to redouble our efforts to help as many of these First Nations, Métis, and Inuit children as possible to finish high school, get post-secondary education, and enter the workforce with the skills, talents and enthusiasm to launch rewarding careers.
We need to give this generation of teenage girls access to family planning resources to give them the chance to finish their schooling and start work before starting healthy families of their own.
We need to equip the urban aboriginal kids of today to overcome generations of social chaos and family breakdown and institutional racism, to help them to stand proud and triumphant, the next leaders of their people and of our community.
This isn't about charity. It's about investment in human infrastructure.
One of the biggest challenges facing this city over the next five years is a dire shortage of skilled workers.
We need this generation of aboriginal children to enter the trades and the professions and the arts.
We need them to grow up to be strong, successful parents themselves. We must act, decisively and immediately or run the risk of dooming thousands to a future in an economic and social ghetto. As a community, we simply can't afford to have 10 per cent of our population grow up as members of a permanent underclass.
For while this youth boom creates enormous stresses on our education system, our health-care system, our social welfare system, our criminal justice system, it also represents the best and brightest hope for the native community and for the rest of us.
These children and their families have chosen to live in Edmonton because they perceive it as a place of greater opportunity.
It's up to us to provide them the opportunities they crave, need and deserve. It's time for our educational institutions, our business community and every level of government to pull together to make sure this generation isn't a lost generation.
That would be a victory for us all to celebrate.
psimons@thejournal.canwest.com
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From the Toronto Star Editorial
The aboriginal census
Jan 17, 2008
Many aboriginals in Canada live in dire poverty, with little access to the education, health care, housing and jobs that non-aboriginals take for granted. Only when these problems boil over, as they sometimes do in land-claim disputes (Caledonia) or public-health crises (Kashechewan), does the country sit up and take notice, if only fleetingly.
But the latest census data from Statistics Canada show this country ignores endemic problems among aboriginals at its peril.
Canada's aboriginal population is closing in on 1.2 million people, and growing quickly. Between 1996 and 2006, the number of people in Canada who identified themselves as aboriginal jumped by 45 per cent. By contrast, Canada's non-aboriginal population grew by only 8 per cent during the same period.
Furthermore, the census data show that aboriginal peoples are far more likely than non-aboriginals to live in crowded or substandard housing and that aboriginal children live in single-parent families in disproportionate numbers.
Yet Prime Minister Stephen Harper killed the 2005 Kelowna Accord, which was negotiated by the previous Liberal government under Paul Martin to address many of these issues.
The anger, frustration and alienation already percolating among aboriginals across the country will only grow with their numbers. The fact that Canada's aboriginal population is far younger than the country's non-aboriginal population, with a median age of just 27, will heighten the risk of militancy.
These census figures are just the latest proof, if any more were needed, that Canada simply cannot afford to turn a blind eye any longer.
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Aboriginals Face Vast Disparities
By Tara Brautigam - The Canadian Press - 2008/1/17
From overcrowded shacks to spacious suburban-style homes, Canada’s aboriginals live in a nation divided.
As a group, they are less affluent than the rest of the population, and the financial disparities that separate aboriginals themselves are vast.
On the Six Nations of Grand River Reserve, the largest and perhaps wealthiest of all First Nations in Canada near Brantford, Ont., signs of relative affluence are everywhere. Newish vans travel the well-paved streets as families enjoy the benefits of a modern health clinic, hockey arena and even horseback riding for recreation.
Skip over to the mean streets of Winnipeg’s North End community of William Whyte, and the graffiti-scarred homes with their broken windows and bedsheet curtains, put a starkly different view of aboriginal life on view.
The first measures of the relative fortunes of aboriginals across Canada revealed by the 2006 census was released this week by Statistics Canada. Figures revealed that the share of natives living in crowded homes has declined to 11 per cent from 17 per cent in a decade, although nearly one in four still lives in homes they say are in need of major repair.
Aboriginals are four times as likely as the rest of the population to live in crowded conditions, and three times as likely to live in a crumbling home.
But housing varies enormously from one aboriginal group to another as well as within aboriginal groups.
The Inuit living in Canada’s North are less crowded than they were a decade ago, but still 40 per cent of Inuit children live in crowded homes, more than six times the proportion among non-aboriginal children. Hospitalization rates for Inuit children with severe respiratory tract infections are the highest in the world, and research has shown that crowding, along with poor ventilation in Inuit homes plays a significant role.
Among First Nations, there was some improvement in living conditions on reserve over the past decade, especially in Ontario and Quebec. Off reserve, conditions varied wildly.
The Metis also experienced a decrease in the share of people living in crowded, dilapidated homes, and the worst conditions are experienced by rural Metis living in the Prairie provinces.
Overcrowding and the need for home repairs were most common in Canada’s western and Prairie cities: Prince Albert, Regina, Saskatoon, Edmonton and Winnipeg were four to 11 times more likely to live in crowded conditions than their non-aboriginal counterparts.
In contrast, those living in Montreal, Ottawa, Vancouver and Toronto were less likely than non-aboriginals to live in crowded homes.
At the Brantford Six Nations recreation centre, Joanne Lickers, an administration team leader for Six Nations Parks and Recreation, says people are well aware of the amenities they have that aboriginals lack.
“They appreciate their facilities,” said Lickers, herself an aboriginal.
“They don’t take it for granted.”
Standing next to the reserve’s hockey arena, which was given a major facelift in 2005, Lickers points out two baseball diamonds across the field. Nearby is a stable for horseback riding.
Commercial buildings are clean and well-maintained. The reserve also boasts a comprehensive health-care system for its approximately 23,000 community members.
Along with a local federally run clinic with four full-time physicians, the community recently opened the White Pines Wellness Centre, a band-run clinic offering programs like early childhood development, mental health services and nutritional programs.
Walking through the bright two-storey building _ which smells of fresh paint and features skylights and a small indoor garden _ acting centre director Alana Hill says the clinic will soon offer dialysis treatment so diabetics won’t have to travel off reserve.
About 15 years ago, the band’s suite of health services comprised of two programs and employed six staff.
“Today we are 232 staff providing approximately 22 wellness programs,” she said, adding that the health centre has an annual operating budget of $14 million and services more than 4,000 community members.
In Winnipeg’s William Whyte district, where 40 per cent of residents are aboriginal, Donna Moose, a 32-year-old mother of five on social assistance, is desperate to leave her two-storey century home.
“It’s become a hotel for mice, which really sucks. I hope that I find a place before she starts crawling,” Moose said, cradling her cooing four-month-old baby girl.
“There’s no way I’m letting her crawl on these floors.”
Her unfinished basement, with its windows sealed to deter thieves, is mouldy, and Moose suspects the home has problems with its foundation. Cracks of varying sizes mark the walls of many rooms.
Moose is on a waiting list for a home that will provide more room for her expanding family; her 14-year-old daughter will become a mother herself this spring. But the family could be waiting for another two years.
“It’s a struggle to try and find good housing,” she said.
But improved housing alone doesn’t necessarily translate into better social conditions.
In December 2002, the Innu of northern Labrador left their one-room shacks in Davis Inlet for Natuashish, a $152-million federally funded settlement of 680 residents with insulated housing, a health clinic, a skating arena and school.
Five years later, the reserve continues to grapple with the substance and alcohol abuse problems that followed with the move.
“We have some things that we didn’t have in Davis, like running water, warm housing, a new school,” said John Nui, deputy chief of the local band council.
“But ... obviously we have a lot of problems still.”
Erin O’Sullivan, a senior researcher with Indians Affairs, said that doesn’t surprise her.
“That’s what happens when you build people new houses and put them in there and don’t give them the skills and income bases to maintain that housing,” O’Sullivan said.
O’Sullivan co-authored a 2004 federal study that measured well-being among First Nations by examining income, education, labour force activity and housing as indicators.
It found that housing and income were the most influential factors in determining well-being among this population.
Statistics Canada plans a series of releases over the coming year examining other factors including income rates and education.
For now, Cynthia Wesley-Esquimaux, an aboriginal studies professor at the University of Toronto, said it’s clear there is no consistency in the quality of life for aboriginals on and off reserve, and that living conditions vary further from southern to Northern Canada.
“They’re expected to live in these boxy little houses and have running water ... which are all challenges in the North because of the temperatures,” Wesley-Esquimaux said.
“You can’t put a Popsicle stick factory into a community like that because it doesn’t resonate with them.”
(Additional reporting by Tamara King in Winnipeg and Jered Stuffco in Toronto)
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Aboriginal population shifting to urban sites
By Chelsey Romain - January 16, 2008
More Aboriginals are moving away from First Nations and into urban areas such as Timmins, according to a Statistics Canada census.
The new census data released Tuesday, said three quarters of First Nations Aboriginals are packing up and moving to the province's bigger centres.
In Timmins alone, the number of Aboriginal persons living in the city increased from 2,880 to 3,290, an increase of approximately 14 per cent from 2001 to 2006.
"There's nothing for them in their own communities," said Wahgoshig First Nation Chief David Babin. "We give them their education here, but then they have to move elsewhere for jobs."
Babin said more First Nation communities are trying to create an economic base by working with the forestry and mining sectors to bring educated citizens back home. But it isn't just work that is keeping First Nation people from remaining in their own communities, but the fact that there simply isn't anywhere to live, Babin said.
"They have to go somewhere to raise their families, because we can't accommodate them," said Babin.
MPP Gilles Bisson (NDP - Timmins-James Bay) said the lack of basic infrastructure is another example of how both levels of government have failed to meet the needs of First Nation communities.
"This is 50 years of neglect," said Bisson. "It's difficult to pick it up in two or three years.
"It's the state of the reserves, everything is a whole whack more difficult."
According to the census, less than 20 per cent of the province's total 2006 Native population are living on First Nations.
The census said that historically, Aboriginal people have been reluctant to participate in the census, but by hiring a communications staff to visit First Nations, an appeal for co-operation has made the 2006 census the most detailed compiled data on Canada's Aboriginal population.
"We want them to know they always have a place to come home to." says Wahgoshig First Nation Chief David Babin
The census also shows that more Canadians than ever have identified themselves as Aboriginals, surpassing the one million mark by almost 200,000. Besides the increased participation, Stats Canada explains the increase by saying Aboriginal Canadians tend to have a higher birth rate than non-Aboriginals and more people of mixed ancestry are coming forward, identifying themselves as Aboriginals.
Many of First Nations in the Timmins area have since a slight increase in their populations, with an age median ranging from mid-20s to mid-30s.
As a governing body, Babin said they are trying to maintain stability in their communities and want to make sure there are reasons for their people to return home.
"We're working with government to better our communities, but we only get so much money and some times it all falls on deaf ears," said Babin.
"I know some people would like to stay, but can't and have to go elsewhere.
"But we want them to know they always have a place to come home to."