Funding fears raise questions

Urban First Nations are asking questions about a new provincial government initiative, the program called the New Relationship Trust earmarks 100 million dollars to strengthen First Nations communities. The money is expected to be forwarded to the original First Nations communities, which has those living in urban areas concerned that they won’t have their issues addressed in the urban environment.

The Daily News had a page one story on the percolating issue.

URBAN FIRST NATIONS QUESTION NEW FUND
By Sarah Fox
The Daily News
Thursday, August 24, 2006
Pages One and Two

Urban First Nations are concerned they are being left out of the governments $100 million New Relationship.

Their comments were heard yesterday at Nisga’a Hall, during discussions about the fund set aside by the provincial government under the New Relationship Trust, which is meant to strengthen First Nations communities.

Jacob Beaton of Copper Moon, who gave a presentation outlining the objectives of the board currently involved in managing the $100 million trust, did not hesitate to inform the people in attendance that the trust is bound by law to be spent to foster communication and relationship building between reserve-based or original First Nations communities and the provincial government regarding such issues as economic development.

“When you look at the language, it is currently targeted at reserves or I guess other First Nations communities and essentially what they are looking for are places like Masset, New Aiyansh, Kitkatla and places that are, yes, reserves, but the original community sites I suppose,” said Beaton.

This was a major cause of concern for those who attended the meeting because, as Frank Alexcee, elected official of the Nisga’a government said, 60 per cent of First Nations peoples live off reserves.

“I expected that there would be a lot of concerns from this community about the lack of support or lack of language to support urban First Nations… from what I understand the direction of the board is that (the trust) is for rural communities, this is for reserves … but what happened today is people had a lot to say about what’s going on in urban communities, but we’re listening and that’s our job,” said Beaton.

Alexcee was quick to point out the hardships that urban First Nations face one they leave the reservations for education or jobs.

“Once you leave the reserve or up there, there’s a line there, and everything stops there,” said Alexcee.

“What we get here in (Prince Rupert), we have to fight for, everything we have, including this building, we have to fight for by ourselves.

“Sixty per cent of our people live off reserve … why is that … we’re leaving because of education and work.

“Now, when you talk about $100 million for the reserve people … what about $1000 million for the urban people? It should be $200 million because 60 per cent of us are off and I don’t think we’re ever going back … so we need to look at, seriously, how can you accommodate people off reserves as much as what you’re doing for the ones that are on reserves.”

Alexcee said that urban First Nations have extreme barriers to education and training due to a lack of funds.

Eddie Gladstone, a concerned First Nations Rupertite agreed with Alexcee saying:” We don’t get anything once we’re off the reserve.”

May Nichols, another concerned Prince Rupert citizen, said that First Nations people need good health care for seniors whether they are on or off reserve.

“You can’t live beside a hospital on every reserve but if you come to Prince Rupert or an area that’s not on reserve, senior citizens need to have a place to stay,” said Nichols.

“There’s nothing for First Nations senior citizens in the way of a First Nations senior citizen’s nursing home or care.

“Another thing that might be needed in this area if you aren’t close to a hospital is for the mentally handicapped or disabled people on reservations to get help that is not necessarily available to them on the reservation.”

During the rest of the meeting the group came up with challenges and barriers within their community – Prince Rupert – that the board governing the trust fund should be concerned with.

Some of the challenges that came up were: a lack of an urban voice; money for urban First Nations peoples; lack of a voice from this region; lack of care for elders and youth; a high poverty level, especially for single moms and not enough funds allocated to help First Nations entrepreneurs start their businesses.

Some of the barriers identified were: money: too many bureaucratic layers in the government leading to people falling through the cracks; trying to get money for vocational training and getting stuck in the welfare cycle where as long as you are collecting welfare there are difficulties in finishing high school as an adult. Beaton closed the consultation session by noting all the concerns that were voiced in his laptop computer and then handing out a comprehensive survey on what participants in the discussion thought should be done with the $100 million New Relationship Trust.

Northcoast MLA Gary Coons will have copies of that survey in his office for anybody who is interested in completing one.