First Nation, ministry face off over logging

Most people wouldn't take such a positive view having been charged with a number of offences, including property damage and illegal harvesting of timber, but Chief Dean Sayers isn't most people.
He sees the charges he's now facing as historic, and an opportunity for his community, the Batchewana First Nation, to deal with concerns over provincial harvesting practices and seek clarity of their treaty relationship with the Crown.
A year ago, members of the Batchewana First Nation decided enough was enough. Damage to the forests of their territory, an area that stretches along the shores of Lake Superior west from Sault Ste. Marie to Marathon and inland, must stop.
"We were really disgusted with the way the province does the harvesting," Sayers explained, referring to clear cuts and other practices that jeopardize the future of the forest.
So the band implemented its own forest management plan and issued licenses to permit harvesting in three townships north of Sault Ste. Marie.
Last month, Ontario's ministry of natural resources (MNR) seized logs and equipment from those doing the harvesting under Batchewana's permits, and on Oct. 10 MNR enforcement supervisor Dave Harnish arrived at the band's office to lay charges against the chief and three band members.
Gilles Robinson, Philip Swanson, Clinton Robinson and Sayers are charged with harvesting timber without a permit under Ontario's Crown Forest Sustainability Act.
Sayers and the band are charged with illegally issuing permits.
In addition, Sayers is charged with damage to Crown property in the removal of a gate that barred access to a traditional village site in Lake Superior Park.
Sayers said the band, in turn, served Harnish with notice of an investigation into the ministry's role and that of district manager Bob Johnson in "the theft of logs and other materials."
Ministry officials refused comment because the matter is before the courts.
Sayers said the charges will allow the First Nation to challenge the "flawed" 1850 Robinson-Huron Treaty and the 1859 Pennefather Treaty, a "travesty" that led to the Batchewana people being defrauded of reserve lands.
"We never gave up responsibility for the forests," he said. "Those lands the Crown refers to as Crown lands, those are our lands in our minds."
Sayers said that because of the Indian Act (including a provision, repealed in 1951, that made it a criminal offence to hire a lawyer to pursue a land claim) and related oppression, it's only within the last two generations that the Batchewana communities have been able to challenge the way the treaties have been implemented and interpreted.
Batchewana is a First Nation of 2,300 people in four reserve locations­Goulais Bay, Rankin, Obadjiwan and Whitefish Island.
He added that it's unfortunate that the case won't be heard by an impartial body, but rather by a court of the Canadian Crown. Still, "we're optimistic that we're going to see the truth finally come out about our relationship."
Sayers said the First Nation based its forest management plan on spiritual and community values. Asked if expert help was used, he emphatically said no.
"We didn't want expert help," he explained. "We've seen the condition of the forest with the expert help that the government had.
"We don't damage the canopy. We don't do clear cuts. We do flora and fauna surveys. We mark each tree that's chosen for harvest and have a ceremony to let those trees know that they're going to be used."
Sayers said it's unfair the province has seized timber and trucks worth thousands of dollars from individuals who are now left without a livelihood or a way to make payments on the equipment.
In addition, he said, "the Crown has told all the businesses in the Soo (Sault Ste. Marie) not to buy (wood) from us, so we're blackballed. It's sickening."
The men should be allowed to continue working pending resolution of the charges, he said.
A consortium called Clergue Forest Management Inc. is licensed by MNR to harvest the Algoma Forest, which comprises the area in dispute. Clergue partners are local businesses, as well as a couple of major forestry companies-Weyerhaeuser Co. Ltd., Domtar Inc., Boniferro Mill Works Inc., Levesque Plywood Ltd. (Columbia Forest Products), St. Marys Paper Ltd. and Midway Lumber Mills Ltd.
Sayers said the charge relating to removal of a gate is connected to the re-opening of a road to Gargantua Bay in Lake Superior Park.
"It's a safety issue,'' he said
The bay is one of the few protected harbours along that stretch of the shoreline and Batchewana fishermen need to be able to use it. Community members had always been able to get to the site, which has spiritual significance for them, until it was blocked by MNR about 15 years ago. Batchewana took action last fall to regain access after years of fruitless negotiations with the ministry, Sayers said.