Housing crisis continues in Attawapiskat

For over a year, five families in Attawapiskat First Nation have been living in tents, and there is concern they will have to go through yet another winter without proper housing.
Other Mushkegowuk communities are facing similar housing conditions.
Kashechewan and Fort Albany both have two or three families living in make-to-do sheds. While other communities face houses with poor living conditions that are either condemned or in need of major repair.
Long waiting lists of young families in need of a home is another problem.
“The year is supposed to be 2011 and yet some residents in Ontario and Canada living in the James Bay communities in the remote area of northern Ontario are forced to live in tent-frame structures, wooden storage sheds, hazardous and condemned homes, and for the most part, the housing situation in our region is very poor and in a crisis,” Mushkegowuk deputy grand chief Leo Friday said.
Friday claims these poor housing conditions are contributing to health and social problems within the Mushkegowuk communities.
The average person per household in Canada is 2.3, while it ranges from six to eight persons per household in some Mushkegowuk communities, a press release from Friday stated.
The press release also said that in Attawapiskat there are only 304 homes and 3,281 residents. Kashechewan has 268 homes for its 1,900 residents and Fort Albany’s population is 1,000 with only 150 houses.
“There is definitely something terribly wrong, this is not right and something has to be done,” Friday said.
At the 2011 annual general meeting of the Omushkegowuk, the delegates declared the current housing conditions are violating basic Canadian and international standards and rights. Also, the chiefs and councils will be working to lobby the governments of Ontario and Canada to secure funding to assist families currently living in tents and sheds.
“We received a letter from a concerned grandmother in Attawapiskat worried about her grandchildren going through another winter living in a tent,” Friday said. “She added that the First Nation did what they could to help them, but there is no funding for new houses in the community.”
The Mushkegowuk Council said they would be engaging the government through the offices of their MPP Giles Bisson and MP Charlie Angus to resolve these housing issues.