Matawa First Nations Management’s Four Rivers Environmental Services Group distributed a variety of Thanksgiving meal favourites, including carrots, potatoes, apples and pumpkins, on Oct. 7 to Matawa citizens from the Matawa Garden project.
A group of First Nations launched a legal proceeding in Ontario Divisional Court over the provincial government’s changes to the Ontario Environmental Assessment Act (EAA) and the related Class EA for forestry.
Missanabie Cree First Nation recently concluded a negotiated settlement with the federal government over a Treaty Land Entitlement Claim for reserve land promised under Treaty No. 9 more than 110 years ago. The settlement includes about $150 million in financial compensation and the ability to add up to 3,200 acres to their reserve land base.
The Matawa Chiefs Council issued a rejection of the provincial government’s Bill 197, COVID-19 Economic Recovery Act, 2020.
Northern Nishnawbe Education Council (NNEC) plans to operate the Dennis Franklin Cromarty and Pelican Falls high schools under a quadmester system this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It also plans to operate the Wahsa Distance Education Centre through its usual remote delivery system with learning centres in the communities according to the school calendar that was approved this past spring.
Deputy Grand Chiefs Derek Fox and Jason Smallboy recently delivered Nishnawbe Aski Nation (NAN) WRN updates on COVID-19 education funding requests and COVID-19 health protocols in early September.
“We asked the federal government for $33 million for the start of the school year in supports, that’s $33 million for 49 First Nations of NAN,” Fox says during his September WRN update. “We have roughly 9,000 students in Nishnawbe Aski Nation, and when you divide that (into) $33 million that’s about $3,600 per student.”
The Sioux Lookout Zone Children’s Environmental Health Study Team recently received an award for their study on Indoor Air Quality and the Effect on Children’s Respiratory Health in First Nation Reserves in the Sioux Lookout Zone. The study team, which evaluated the indoor air quality in the houses of 101 children in four Indigenous communities, was recognized with the 2020 Health Canada Assistant Deputy Minister Award for Excellence in Sciences.
Weenusk artist Dolores Gull is looking forward to co-hosting the 2nd annual virtual Indigenous fashion show this fall after creating her own version of a plague doctor mask during the COVID-19 lockdown. Gull and co-host Jennifer Wabano, who held their first fashion show in Timmins in November 2019, are hosting this year’s fashion show to showcase their handmade crafts and custom apparel, with their models doing a virtual runway walk in the bush trail.
A group of seven high school students are enjoying the opportunity to grow, harvest and sell vegetables and honey this summer through Roots to Harvest’s Urban Youth Farm Program in Thunder Bay.
“It’s good labour and a nice workout,” says Kiaren Wapoose, a Hammarskjold High School student from Eabametoong who was working at the vegetable market stand on Aug. 6. “It’s gone alright — I find it a little stress relieving working with other people.”
Wapoose says he likes working with the potato plants at the farm but has also worked twice with the honeybees.
Eabametoong evacuated about 513 Elders, children, medical priority residents and their supports to Thunder Bay, Timmins and Kapuskasing after declaring a forest fire and smoke emergency on Aug. 11. The Nipigon 45 forest fire is located about 35 kilometres southwest of the Matawa community. The Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry’s forest fires webpage states the fire was not under control on Aug. 15, but noted there was low fire behaviour and relative high humidity which should keep smoke issues to a minimum.
Blogs & Columns
The news that the graves of 215 children had been discovered near the site of a former residential school in Kamloops, British Columbia came as shock to me...
When I look up at the clear blue sky these days I am missing something. For about a year now during this wretched pandemic I have hardly seen any contrails...