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Twenty-one single family homes built on the Cold Lake First Nations Reserve with federal government assistance were officially opened here February 27th.

During a ribbon-cutting ceremony that included presentation of a Canadian flag and a flag marking the occasion, Chief Francis Scanie was handed a cheque for $20,024. It is the first of regular payments to be made as housing subsidies.

The cheque was presented by John McWilliams, Edmonton Manager of Program Operations for the federal Canadian Mortgage & Housing Corporation.

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A land swap deal witll see over 250 acres of land exchange hands between the federal government and Fort McKay.

Fort McKay Chief Jim Boucher said, "we will exchange (McKay Reserve) land which is situated on the east side of the Athabasca River for land on the west side of the river where some McKaY residents live at present."

Band council member, Edith Orr, says that "McKay is going to swap the government acre for acre."

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A small gathering of women met in Calgary last week to discuss a painful, and at times embarrassing subject, sexual child abuse.

The workshop, organized by Gillian Shumski, a doctoral student at the University of Calgary, is being funded by Alberta Native Womens Association (ANWA) and is the first of its kind ever held for Native women.

Shumski explained the problem to the women and pointed out that her thesis could prove to be the basis of future funding for reserve and settlement treatment centres for women and children who have been abused.

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No feedback from Native people for planned store

"I envy the Indian philosophy very much, but when it comes to business, it is a nightmare. Indian time and out time are not the same thing," said Carol Smith, a Glenbow official who is organizing an Indian arts and crafts store for the Calgary Winter Olympic Games.

Smith, a retail coordinator with the museum says she has had absolutely no feed back from Alberta's Native people regarding "the planned store" selling Native arts and crafts.

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"Native hopes crushed as talks fail," said the front page headline on my local newspaper on the day after the First Ministers Conference on Aboriginal rights. I've heard other news reports to the same effect-that Native leaders are sad and depressed by the conference failure. I think it's time to correct that impression before Native people get the idea that they should start looking for a bridge to jump off. I certainly didn't feel crushed or even disappointed by the outcome of the conference. Instead, I felt better and stronger than I have for years.

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A hereditary chief of the west coast Gedumden nation has had her people's traditions as well as her innocence upheld in a recent British Columbia court decision.

Just before Christmas, 1984, Chief Mabel Forsythe and her daughter Nancy were wrongly accused of shoplifting and searched in public on the main street of Smither, B.C.

It was later proven that Chief Forsythe and her daughter had not been involved in the shoplifting of a SONY Walkman from a store in the tiny central B.C. town.

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Overcrowded living conditions, substandard sewer and water systems and poverty are blamed for the high rate of tuberculosis infection among Indians in Manitoba.

Dr. Earl Hershfield, director of Manitoba's tuberculosis control centre, says "tuberculosis should not be a problem in developed countries," because of successful TB vaccines developed in the 1950s.

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The case of Leonard Peltier, an American Indian who was extradited from Canada to the United States in 1976 will be debated in the Canadian House of Commons sometime in April.

Jim Fulton, NDP member of Parliament for the Skeena riding in B.C. will introduce a private member's motion in the Canadian Parliament, which calls for a return of Peltier to Canadian soil.

Fulton questions the way evidence was withheld by the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI), in the extradition hearing of Peltier, who was facing murder charges in the United States at that time.

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Metis right recognized

A controversy that exploded at the Metis Association of Alberta (MAA) Annual Assembly over the membership of a Calgary woman was settled quickly and quietly at the Zone 3 annual general meeting March 21.

Freda Martell, whose membership in the association has been questioned by a Red Deer Local was reinstated as a member after a sworn oath was submitted in her defense.

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