Trust. Integrity. Reputation.
1997 Windspeaker December Headlines
Due to the continuing strike at Canada Post.
Windspeaker's December issue has been delayed.
Windspeaker will be mailed as soon as the strike is over.
AMMSA apologizes for any inconvenience to our subscribers.
No, it's your fault - editorialAboriginal radio proposal loses out
Border crossing decision appealed
C-31 court case can continue without Twinn
Here is a full list of the stories featured in the December, 1997 issue of Windspeaker. If you are not receiving your own copy of Windspeaker, then you have missed many of these exciting stories. Click here for Windspeaker subscription information.
Feds in confict over tax exemption
Sentences evolving
Aboriginal veterans gave Candians a future
Stories about war experiences haunt reader
Phil, why don't you call? - Column
Look to Las Vegas - letter
Comedy character riles CBC viewer - letter
Limitedinput angers member - letter
Crees contribute to the efforts in Bosnia - letter
Christmas as peacekeeper - letter
Smithsonian CD explores influence of the violin
Dead Dog Cafe Comedy Hour returns
Family learning, family fun in TOPONA
A Brother's Gift - Christmas contest
My best Christmas ever - Christmas contest
A Christmas wish - Christmas contest
Sports heroes help Aboriginal youth
UPS delivers the goods to advance sport
Employment Equity Act opens doors for Native job-seekers
December, 1997
Aboriginal radio proposal loses out
By Paul Barnsley
Windspeaker Staff Writer
TORONTO
An Ontario radio station owner tried to invest almost $2 million towards establishing a national Aboriginal radio network but he couldn't get a broadcasting license from the Canadian Radio-Television Telecommunications Commission.
Doug Bingley, controlling shareholder of Barrie's Rock 95 FM, said he learned a lot about the frustrations that Aboriginal people encounter when they deal with the federal government after he attempted to obtain a space on the FM dial for a joint venture with Aboriginal Voices, an Aboriginal-owned quarterly magazine that is based in Toronto.
"The Broadcasting Act and CRTC policy encourages Aboriginal participation," Bingley said. "Based on that, the frequency should have been awarded to our proposal. But it wasn't. I see Aboriginal broadcasting as a big issue. I read the policy and interpreted it to mean that if we were willing to assist Aboriginal broadcasting then the CRTC would give us a license. But they gave the frequency to the CBC. That decision makes the policy look like so much lip service paid to Aboriginal interests. My attitude is: if you're not going to do it, say you're not going to do it. Don't make some dopey policy and then ignore it."
Bingley's proposal received the least attention during the high-profile, much reported process that led to the decision to give the vacant 99.1 FM frequency to the CBC. The decision was announced last July. The change-over will take place in March.
The media in Toronto focused on the CBC and on another proposal that would have established a station to serve the black community in the Ontario capital region. Bingley feels his proposal was the best when considered in the light of written legislation and policy. He suspects that the decision was influenced by political considerations. After several years of drastic federal funding cuts, there was public pressure on Canadian Heritage Minister Sheila Copps to help CBC Radio. Some observers feel the decision indicates the commissioners felt that pressure.
"That's what I sensed," Bingley said.
Gary Farmer, the publisher of Aboriginal Voices, has no doubt that political issues were played out in the CRTC decision, but he believes the project will soon become a reality anyway. The actor, with several Hollywood motion picture credits on his resume, is from the Six Nations reserve in southern Ontario. When contacted for his comments, he was making plans for a live broadcast during the annual Toronto SkyDome Powwow in late November. He said that there are two other vacant radio frequencies that could be obtained in the near future. Either could be used to broadcast from a transmitter on top of Toronto's CN Tower, the world's tallest free-standing structure. That would ensure wide distribution of the signal in the huge southern Ontario market. Bingley and Farmer said their long-term goal is to use satellite technology to spread the signal across the entire country, creating a national Aboriginal radio network.
"The decision put us back by a year," Farmer said. "We should be there, at the most, two years from now."
For Bingley, a non-Aboriginal businessman, this process has been a revelation.
"It's the first time I've wandered down the Aboriginal path and the impression I got from the bureaucrats was 'We'll get around to you.' That's always the case, it seems. They put it off for a year, then 10 years go by, then 100 years go by and nothing happens," he said. "In the mainstream, you get a vague understanding of Aboriginal issues as you watch them from the periphery. But I saw it first hand."
Bingley believes the CBC could have fixed the problems they were having with the AM 740 spot on the dial, a channel the public broadcaster has used for more than 60 years. They should not have been in the running for the FM frequency, he believes. He said he believes in the system. He is a part of the broadcasting system and believes it has treated him fairly for the most part. That just makes it more puzzling for him that, after he allied himself with an Aboriginal group, the system seemed to stop working the way it should.
"It appears Native people have once again been betrayed by the system," he wrote in a letter to the editor that was published in the Globe & Mail on Oct. 14. "I hope that's not the case."
An appeal to the minister for a review of the CRTC decision by Bingley (and several other groups) met with no response.
CRTC sources insist there was no political influence behind the decision.
Ian Morrison, spokesman for the Friends of Public Broadcasting, a group that watches CRTC decisions and other developments in the Canadian broadcasting business, said the CBC needed to make the change because the AM 740 frequency was unreliable.
"Our position is if CBC programming is available on Baffin
Island and every other remote part of this country then it should
be available clearly in downtown Toronto or Hamilton," he
said. "There were five million people affected by this. They
wanted a strong CBC signal in the Toronto market."
Border crossing decision appealed
By Paul Barnsley
Windspeaker Staff Writer
OTTAWA
The federal government is not willing to accept a Federal Court decision which recognized the rights of the Mohawks of Akwesasne to cross the Canada-United States border without paying customs duties.
On Sept. 25, lawyers working for the Ministry of National Revenue filed a notice of appeal of Judge William P. McKeown's 105-page decision in favor of Mohawk Chief Mike Mitchell. The judge ruled on June 27 that Mitchell did not have to pay the $361.64 in duty that customs officials had billed him after he carried goods across the border into Canada from the United States. McKeown ruled the Mohawks had a constitutionally-protected Aboriginal right to freely cross a border that was drawn through their traditional territory by the colonial powers.
Mitchell, grand chief of the Mohawk Council of Akwesasne, said the government's decision to appeal was a disappointment.
"It was Canada who challenged us to take the issue to court. Now that their own courts have ruled in our favor, they are appealing the decision," he said. "This does not speak well of Canada's commitment to the position it is advocating for partnership between government and First Nations. This is not a show of good faith on the part of Canada."
The judge's decision limited the constitutional protection for the duty-free importation of goods to those goods used for personal and community use.
"Goods for personal and community use includes goods used for sustenance, household goods and goods used for First Nations' custom," McKeown wrote. "The Aboriginal right includes the right to bring these goods from the United States into Canada for non-commercial scale trade with other First Nations."
Mitchell consulted with chiefs and Elders in his community before deciding on which types of goods he would use to test Section 135 of the Customs Act. No goods that could be considered harmful to the community (such as alcohol, drugs or firearms) were included.
The Ministry of National Revenue has spent at least $293,000 so far trying to collect the $361.64 bill from Mitchell. The larger figure represents the legal costs the judge ordered Canada to pay after he rendered his decision. Legal costs will rise as federal government lawyers develope arguments that will be aimed at trying to overturn the decision.
Graham Garton, the Ministry of Justice lawyer who will prepare the government's appeal, is new to the case. Dogan Akman, the Justice lawyer who handled the case at trial is no longer involved.
Garton said he believes the government feels the need to appeal the decision because there is a fear that other First Nations will begin court action to have their traditional border-crossing rights recognized. He said senior Revenue officials are also worried the wording of the decision may leave the door open for First Nations to challenge the payment of other taxes, such as the Goods and Services Tax and provincial sales taxes.
"I've just received this file, but it's my understanding that there's disagreement that an Aboriginal right was defined in this case," Garton said. "Also, the word 'duty' in the decision doesn't necessarily apply just to Customs duties. There's concern, as I understand it, that it could apply to other taxes as well, such as the GST and the PST."
Asked if the bottom line in government and bureaucratic circles was the fear of a potentially sizable loss of taxation revenue as a result of the Mitchell decision, the government lawyer responded, "I would assume so."
The appeal will be heard by the Federal Court of Appeal. A panel of either three or five judges will scour the judgment, looking for errors in law. No new evidence can be presented. Only if the appeal panel can find a misapplication of a statute will the judgment be overturned. The only other legal avenue for Mitchell should the appeal panel reverse McKeown would be an appeal of that decision to the Supreme Court of Canada.
Akwesasne council sources say the Canadian government should recognize the Mitchell decision and should not prolong the expensive court fight.
"We have told Canada that there's nothing to fear by negotiating with the Mohawks on how we plan to implement the exercise of our Aboriginal border crossing rights and trade with other First Nations," Mitchell said. "We have said all along that we would prefer to negotiate with Canada to develop a protocol for the management of our collective Mohawk Nation rights. Court is a hardship on all of us, it is costly in time and resources and reasonable peoples could arrive at more creative solutions outside the court."
While it is customary for an appeal to the Federal Court of Appeal to take up to two years to complete, the two sides are talking and may be able to get the matter before the court as early as next June.
C-31 court case can continue without Twinn
By Rob McKinley
Windspeaker Staff Writer
SLAVE LAKE, Alta.
Alberta Senator and Sawridge First Nation Chief Walter Twinn was a large factor in the push to appeal Bill C-31. Since the senator's death on Oct. 30, many questions remain about the continued support of the wealthy northern Alberta First Nation regarding the controversial issue.
Interview requests to the Sawridge band have not been answered as it attempts to re-structure its administration after more than three decades under Twinn's leadership.
Speculation is that Twinn's wife, Catherine, is planning to take over the Bill C-31 appeal, but she could not be reached for comment.
The C-31 bill has been a troubling issue since it was announced by the federal government in 1985. Initially, the bill was intended to allow thousands of treaty-status women who had married non-treaty men, or people who had previously lost their status for a variety of other reasons, to regain treaty status.
The Sawridge First Nation, near Slave Lake in northern Alberta, and the southern Alberta Native communities of Tsuu T'ina and Ermineskin First Nations, took the bill to task on the grounds that it was not constitutional for the government to regulate who was a treaty member of a particular band.
In 1995, the three First Nations lost their court case to have the bill revoked, but in June of this year that decision was reversed by the Federal Court of Appeal.
That left the door open for the groups to again fight the bill in court.
However, as of Dec. 1, the Congress of Aboriginal people - a national group dedicated to bringing treaty rights back to the people - will file for an appeal of the federal court's most recent ruling. Until their legal work is cleared through the courts, any plans to re-play the original battle over C-31 must wait.
Ermineskin lawyer Marvin Stouro said further action is on hold until the Congress of Aboriginal People's appeal is addressed by the courts.
He said his law firm hasn't heard anything from Ermineskin leaders about when a new challenge to C-31 will take place - if at all.
"We don't have any indication whether to proceed or not," he said from his Vancouver office. "And that's not up to me. It's up to the bands."
Ermineskin representatives could not be reached for comment.
Stouro said the court case could proceed even without Twinn. He said any one of the groups could continue the court battle independently, because it only takes one to win.
"It can be split up," he said, again adding that his law firm has received no indications from its clients on what will happen next.
Doris Ronnenberg is president of the Alberta chapter of the Native Council of Canada. The council is a provincial component of the national Congress of Aboriginal People. Ronnenberg has been fighting to have the rights of C-31 people re-established as long as Sawridge, Ermineskin and Tsuu T'ina have been fighting against the bill.
Despite being on the other side of the table from Twinn, Ronnenberg was saddened by his death.
"His children lost a father and his family [lost] a husband," she said.
Ronnenberg admired Twinn for his strong business sense and the success he had in his community.
"What you had to give Walter was that he was a good businessman. You can't take that away from him."
Ronnenberg said he will be remembered, but the fight for the rights of C-31 people must go on.
Ronnenberg is confident the appeal taking place now will turn out favorably for those fighting for Bill C-31. She said the Federal Court of Appeal reversed the original decision only because it felt the judge's comments were biased, not because of the contents of the bill.
"They in no way said that the winning was wrong. It was not set aside on the merits of the case. . . it was only the comments of the judge that were viewed as biased," she said.
For now, Ronnenberg and lawyers from both sides of the issue will wait for the outcome of the latest appeal to Bill C-31.
"Everything is at a stand-still," she said.
Estimates on when further action may start up range anywhere
from three to nine months.
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