Media.Knet.Ca

The

Neskantaga First Nation Spring Traditional Powwow

March 23 to 26, 2006

We are pleased to annouce our Powwow coming up on March 23 to 26, 2006. Everyone is welcome to join us with our celebration, dancers, singers, story and legend tellers, elders, children and women, visitors and all the nishinawbe people.

Visitors are required to the following:

• bring sleeping gear
• be alcohol and drugs free
• proper arrangement and supervision for your children
• Provide list of names your group and fax to 807 479 2505

For more inforamtion call Aleck at (807) 479 2530 Thank you very much and we are looking forward in hearing from you!

Kitchi meequetch

in Spirit,

Aleck

From the Aboriginal Youth Suicide Prevention Walk 2006 web site at http://www.yspw.org

The Youth Suicide Prevention Walk will cross Canada started March 14, 2006 in Sydney Cape Breton, and will bring our people in Eastern, Central, and Western Canada together in the shared vision of addressing and ending youth suicide.

These are some of the things we want to accomplish in 2006:

• To continue to remind the Government of Canada about the high rate of suicide within Canada's Aboriginal communities, and the need for ongoing prevention funding and programs. We hope the new Government will hear our voices, and honour committments made to us in 2005.
• To convince the Government to create a Youth Crisis Treatment Facility for those at risk for suicide. A facility which provides access to short and long-term counselling, treatment, and support. A facility which will educate our communities on how to deal with the issues around suicide. We hope that the government will recognize the dire need for such a facility with trained Staff, Elders, and a Crisis Response Team.
• To create a National "Aboriginal, Inuit and Youth Suicide Prevention Awareness Day" which would be recognised on calendars, and with a walk in communities across Canada to raise awareness, and funds for local suicide prevention, much like the Terry Fox Day.
• To make Tribal Journeys so that we can visit and raise awareness in those communities that we may have missed on our Walks, and to help youth who are struggling with suicide issues.
• We feel that if youth partake in the walk, Tribal Journeys and other ceremonies, such as sweats, it will help them to deal with their problems in a safe, cultural environment. We plan to create a place where our youth can come and learn about their culture and the importance of ceremonies.
• To reach out across Canada, and across cultures and borders to recognize how suicide impacts all indigenous people and all youth, and work globally towards prevention and building hope and esteem within our youth.

First Nations across the Sioux Lookout Health Zone are now being kept up-to-date about community health information sessions, workshops and discussions. Community Telehealth Coordinators are working together to support each, sharing information and skills in the development and maintenance of these web sites for their communities.

Barney Beaver recently launched the Webequie Telehealth web site at http://webequiekotelehealth.myknet.org. Links to other community telehealth web sites can be found from the menu box on the KO Telehealth web site at http://telehealth.knet.ca

At INAC's Connecting Aboriginal Canadians workshop in Ottawa this week, INAC officials used this opportunity to launch another web site called a "Virtual Tour of Aboriginal Canada". Aboriginal communities across the country need to now check to make sure their community's web site is properly linked (and updated) on INAC's web site.

The web site can be found at http://www.aboriginalcanada.gc.ca/abdt/apps/VTAC.nsf/splash.html

It is introduced as EXPLORE ABORIGINAL CANADA

by Connecting to Aboriginal Communities

by Connecting to Aboriginal Tourism Businesses

DEVELOP PARNTERSHIPS OR CAPACITY

by connecting to the Aboriginal Business Centre

by connecting to the Aboriginal Tourism Resource Centre

Ever wonder who Aboriginal people really are, where they live, how they live, etc.?

Find out by visiting Aboriginal communities on line. Better yet come and visit us and you'll have an experience of a lifetime.

Indians, Metis & Inuit peoples with unique heritages, languages, cultural practices & spiritual beliefs.

Interestingly enough, this web site and all these conferences are funded from the corporate side of INAC. No new INAC funding programs to support First Nations in building and maintaining broadband infrastructure or for producing and maintaining their own community web sites and developing their own local capacity to do business online are being announced.

Unity is the common theme for this year's race relations week long event starting March 20th.

First Nations across northern Ontario have been connecting all their buildings to broadband services over the past several years using wireless or cable infrastructure. Now that Toronto has finally caught onto this work, it is making the news in a big way.

From the Toronto Star ... http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1141643034143&call_pageid=968332188492&col=968793972154&t=TS_Home

T.O. to become wireless hotspot
Mar. 6, 2006.
TYLER HAMILTON -TECHNOLOGY REPORTER

Toronto Hydro Corp. will announce Tuesday that it plans to turn Canada's largest city into one giant wireless hotspot, directly challenging the country's major mobile phone carriers for a chunk of the $8 billion a year wireless market.

With the deployment, which sources say could be available in the downtown core as early as this fall, Toronto joins a growing list of North American cities, including Philadelphia, New Orleans and San Francisco, that have announced plans to bring low-cost, broadband wireless access to their citizens and businesses.

"I wouldn't be surprised if you see it in September or October of this year," said a source close to the project.

Mayor David Miller will join Toronto Hydro executives on Tuesday to officially announce the initiative, which will be the largest of its kind ever undertaken in Canada and could undermine commercial product offerings from Rogers Wireless, Telus Mobility and Bell Mobility.

"I've heard that Ted Rogers is not very happy," said the source, referring to the founder of Toronto-based Rogers Communications Inc., parent company of Rogers Wireless, the country's largest mobile phone provider.

So-called municipal Wi-Fi, which blankets entire cities with the same wireless network technology found in many homes and small businesses, makes broadband access virtually ubiquitous and gives municipalities a way of generating revenue while offering affordable high-speed Internet access to low-income persons and neighbourhoods.

It also gives cities a way to attract tourists and business professionals, provides local police with better access to law enforcement databases while on the road, and helps city officials remotely monitor parking meters and other automated services. Toronto Hydro might also choose to sell a wholesale version of the service to other service providers.

In Ontario, where smart meters have been mandated, electrical utilities are looking at various telecommunications technologies for retrieving data from people's homes and businesses for time-of-day billing purposes.

Sources say Toronto Hydro has decided to support its smart meter plan using Wi-Fi technology, which can be accessed by any properly equipped laptop or handheld computing device.

Brian Sharwood, a telecom analyst with the Seaboard Group in Toronto, said it makes sense for a utility to recoup the cost of supporting smart meters by also selling wireless broadband services. "In a way that's the excuse to do all of this," he said. "You're going to run it past a lot of people anyway."

He said Canada's largest municipal electrical utility, which last year purchased Toronto's street light system for $60 million, will likely install the necessary wireless transmitters and receivers atop every fourth or fifth lamp post as a way to blanket the city with coverage -- what the industry describes as "wireless mesh networking."

Several companies offer the technology, including Kanata, Ont.-based BelAir Networks and Brampton-based Nortel Networks. Utilities in Hamilton and Sault Ste. Marie are pursuing similar Wi-Fi strategies for their respective smart meter programs.

Municipal Wi-Fi projects aren't without controversy. In the United States, major wireless carriers say municipalities have no experience selling consumer services and are abusing their monopoly over taxpayers' funds. They also fear that their own Wi-Fi services, increasingly offered in airports, restaurants, coffee shops and hotels, will be undercut when it comes to price.

But municipalities argue that competition is healthy and that blanketing communities with low-cost broadband access helps bridge the digital divide.

The announcement Tuesday by Toronto Hydro will follow VIA Rail Canada's decision to begin offering Wi-Fi service on all its trains between Windsor and Quebec City over the course of the year.

The British Columbia Connectivity Co-Operative is hosting a petition in favour of the CRTC's recent decision to use deferral account funds to enhance broadband infrastructure in remote and rural communities and access to telecommunications for persons with disabilities.

This is a good thing, and people in these remote and rural communities need help, badly.

Please sign the petition at www.petitiononline.com/BC3/

(Please forward this on to friends, colleagues and other lists as you see fit to get as many people as possible involved).

On February 16, 2006 the CRTC announced their decision to provide up to $650 million for broadband development in rural and remote communities, and for persons with disabilities.

The CRTC backgrounder can be found at http://www.crtc.gc.ca/eng/NEWS/RELEASES/2006/r060216.htm

The decision itself is available at http://www.crtc.gc.ca/archive/ENG/Decisions/2006/dt2006-9.htm

Since then a number of consumer advocacy groups lead by urban media "sources" have expressed dissent to the decision, stating that the "over-charges" should be "refunded" to consumers instead of used to support infrastructure development in remote and rural communities. Please consider completing their online survey that can be found at:
http://www.piac.ca/survey/crtc_deferral_account_what_consumers_want

The British Columbia Connectivity Co-Operative has started a petition supporting the CRTC's decision.

If you support this decision, please sign the petition to voice your support at http://www.petitiononline.com/BC3

"The availability of broadband services is critical to the social and economic development of rural and remote communities. Targeted action is required to ensure that these communities will have reliable and affordable access to these services. Broadband services have taken on increased importance in health, education, business, government, and communications to the point where these services are now as important as basic telecommunications, and arguably more important to those in rural and remote areas. Furthermore, the provision of broadband access is critically important to lower barriers that rural and remote communities have to accessing the new networked economy. If we do not assist these communities now, they will fall further behind the urban areas and only create a larger problem later. 26% of the Canadian workforce lives outside the major areas and 40% of the natural resource exports are generated in these areas as well. This economic engine must not be allowed to fail."

Broadband is essential to our economy as a whole, and for rural and remote social and economic development.

Matthew Asham
British Columbia Wireless Network Society
www.bcwireless.net
+1 604 484 5289 x1006

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From http://www.cbc.ca/north/story/handley-afn-03032006.html

Handley grilled by N.W.T. native leaders
Last Updated: Mar 3 2006

Northwest Territories Premier Joe Handley received a rough reception at the regional Assembly of First Nations meeting in N'Dilo, N.W.T., on Thursday, with a number of chiefs taking shots at the territorial government and its priorities in dealing with aboriginal people.  

Handley updated the regional AFN chiefs on the status of agreements, such as resource revenue sharing and devolution.

But a number of chiefs wanted to talk about other issues.

"Your government talks about resources and revenue and devolution and so forth, but I think sometimes your government forgets whose land this really is," said Liidlii Kue Chief Keyna Norwegian.

"Who are the people that lived here before the territorial government was even set up?"

Norwegian also accused the premier of undermining Dehcho efforts to cut a deal with Imperial Oil over pipeline benefits and access. She asked Handley why there was no mention of the need for agreements with aboriginal people in a "letter of comfort" he sent to the Mackenzie Gas Project last fall.

The letter assured Imperial that royalty rates and taxes are not likely to increase should a devolution agreement be reached with Ottawa.

"Your letter didn't help us at all, it just supported them and it kind of gave them a feeling that there was no need for or urgency to really sign or negotiate proper access and benefits," she said.

But Handley says the letter only dealt with issues controlled by the territorial government, and access agreements are privately signed between aboriginal organizations and the pipeline proponent.

The Dehcho people have been unable to reach an agreement with Imperial Oil on an access and benefits agreement for the pipeline project (see exchange below - Imperial boss feels the heat).

Settle land claims, chief urges

Dettah Chief Peter Liske of the Yellowknives Dene says Handley's government should focus on settling unresolved land claims.

"If we resolve the Akaitcho process, I think devolution and resource revenue will happen," he says. "And if he concentrated on Dehcho, he wouldn't be having any problems with Mackenzie Valley pipeline."

Handley says his government is elected by all people in the territory, not just aboriginals.

"We are very much a public government and try to represent everyone and try to achieve that balance," said Handley in response to the criticism. "Sometimes it's very difficult to achieve it but it is a balance that we have to continue to deal with every day."

Handley says he will sit down with leaders to further discuss their concerns sometime Friday.

Imperial boss feels the heat

The head of Imperial's Mackenzie Valley Gas Project, Randy Ottenbrite, told N.W.T. chiefs the proposed $7-billion pipeline is well on its way to become a reality.

But Chief Keyna Norwegian demanded to know how he could say that when the company has yet make an acceptable offer for access to Dehcho lands.

"My concern is you are moving forward and not respecting us as the Dene people of the land," she said.

"Those are the things that should have been priorities – making sure you have access to people's lands before you spend millions of dollars on joint review panels and environmental assessments."

Ottenbrite refused to discuss the issue, suggesting Norwegian raise her concerns at the Joint Review Panel public hearings.

"My sense is that that discussion is best left not at this particular forum, but thank you for your comments," he said.

Grand Chief of the Dene Nation Noeline Villebrun says the Dene have good reason to distrust promises of fair treatment.

"There was an agreement 106 years ago that we would share the land and resources and Dene people have lived up to that agreement but the government and industry has not," she said.

Ottenbrite told the chiefs that several access agreements have been successfully reached in other regions and negotiations with the Dehcho are on-going.

From http://www.cbc.ca/ottawa/story/ot-cards20060303.html 

Aboriginal centre hands out legal advice
Last Updated: March 3, 2006 

An aboriginal health centre is trying to educate its clients on the racism they say is plaguing the Ottawa police by handing out business cards outlining their rights if stopped by police.

To combat what they call a longtime problem of racial profiling, the Wabano Centre for Aboriginal Health, located in Vanier, requested a legal aid organization make up the cards, which are the size of two busines cards folded over.

Two weeks ago, counsellors began handing them out to clients.

SERIES: Beyond the Badge: Investigating the Ottawa Police Service

Excerpt from card:

• Officer, if I am under arrest or being detained please tell me so.
• If I am free to go please tell me so.
• If I am not free to go please tell me why.
• I wish to exercise all my legal rights including my right to silence and my right to speak to a lawyer before I say anything to you.
• I do not consent to being searched.
• I wish to be released without delay.
• Please do not ask me questions because I will not willingly talk to you until I speak to a lawyer.
• Thank you for respecting my rights.  

"We want our people to know that they do have rights, that no matter what level they may presently occupy in society they are to be treated with respect, dignity and they are not there for someone to push and intimidate," said Dan Printup, manager of the centre's homelessness program.

The idea was a response to complaints from young people saying they'd been detained on the streets and pulled over in their cars for no apparent reason.

"It's hard to beat our stereotype for natives. Our stereotype growing up was drunk, lazy, welfare, violent, uneducated," said Printup. "How do you beat 10 generations of that way of thinking? It's hard for them to see us as equals."

While Deputy Chief Larry Hill would neither deny nor confirm racial profiling, he acknowledged a growing discontent in the First Nations community. But he stressed that officers still have a job to perform.

"It's a very fine line between what people perceive as 'My rights are being violated,' versus our very real attempts to quell crime in certain areas," said Hill.

He says the police force is searching for ways to bridge the gap between First Nations people and the police, but Hill said the two sides have been at odds for so long it may be hard to close the gap.