New Relationship Fund Success Stories
Visits with First Nation Communities and The Métis Nation of Ontario
October/November 2009
Métis Nation of Ontario
Melanie Paradis
Director of Lands Resources and Consultation
“Well, prior to the New Relationship Fund we had no capacity to deal with literally hundreds of projects that we have been sent notices on across the province and with New Relationship Funding we are able to not only respond in a timely fashion to all those projects but we're able to engage our community members, our citizens and our councils meaningfully in the process of consultation.”
Kiashke Zaaging Anishinaabek (Gull Bay First Nation)
Acting Band Manager/Economic Development Officer
“The funding that's come from the New Relationship Fund, the support we have from your office just helping us out (inaudible) our ideas (inaudible) immensely beneficial. I mean we could not be at the point we are right now without you. What the seed money was able to accomplish was that it helped us establish five jobs, long-term jobs, for right now, certainly for three years and what we are mostly excited about especially right now was the part three, the skills training dollars that we received and the training dollars with those we were able to do because of large amounts of requests for consultation, one of the portions we applied for was an assistant consultation coordinator. We used a large part of that funding to facilitate a First Nations Professional Guide Course. Say the course cost us $30,000, no $60,000, for these three weeks, trainers, everything when First Nations goes to the college it is not going to cost them $60,000, I would think it will cost them $35,000. So other First Nations will be able to do this course that we spent all the time on doing it and get it a lot cheaper than us.”
Wikewemikong
Andrew Manitowabi
Special Projects Community Consultation Facilitator
“The progressive dialogue we are doing that we have with ministries, departments from MNDN to forestry and other sectors and divisions. It is just great to have this money here and its really going to be beneficial at that once the department realizes that we can actually say we got the money in place now let's do our projects and let's do them well. You know I really can't tell you how much more how this is affecting people, not just Wiki but all these First Nation there and are realizing oh we got some money we can start doing some real discussions. We just came from the Canadian Aboriginal Mining Association Conference which the majority of them are probably from the New Relationship Fund and they are all there discussing opportunities and mining that is just one resource. We want to have meaningful part of the prosperity that has taken place in Ontario. We want to be real partners with industry and government. We want to have a voice and this NRF is doing exactly that.”
Lac Seul First Nation
Chris Angeconeb
Lands and Resource Coordinator
“The New Relationship Fund has given us the financial capacity to participate in recognized forums and groups like OWA, CAMA where we are assured that government and industry hear our opinions and we can meet the players face-to-face. Before the current trend toward consultation and accommodation, we would have had to resort to some disobedience to have our voices heard. There's less confrontation now because we're invited to the table more often and earlier.”
Red Rock Indian Band
Kristine Metasinine -Economic Development Officer
Terry Bouchard - Liaison Consultant
Terry: “Its been a big help (inaudible) to receive the funding. It was just incredible, incredibly significant help. It helped us move ahead just in a short length of time. It puts a new visioning prospect for us because the funding that we received already look at how far advanced we moved and if we can keep on receiving more we are going to be far ahead, we are going to be self sufficient, we won't have to rely on GIA nothing we will have our own (inaudible).”
Kristine: “So, what we utilized that funding for is to hire an expert wind consultant or somebody that has worked along those lines, right, so and also hire one member from the Band in order to be mentored by that expert.”
Terry: “(inaudible) for myself, I mean I've been involved in the political field (inaudible) for years. This is the most, this is the step in the right direction where we started, engaging with you people for funding.”
Slide:
“The New Relationship Fund helps First Nation communities and organizations in Ontario focus on strengthening local economies. Through skills training, economic development opportunities and job creation, the quality of life will improve for First Nations.”
Brad Duguid, Minister of Aboriginal Affairs