Archeological finds useful in land claims

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When the Nisga'a Tribal Council was preparing a land claim in northern British Columbia years ago, councilors went to the people for consensus on how much of their traditional lands they wanted returned to them.

Some of the Nisga'a members, council general manager Matt Moore told a recent conference on land claims, expected to retain 100 per cent of the land their ancestors had lived and worked on and advised the council to go for broke.

"That meant we had to spend a lot of money building up a strong military and fight both the provincial and federal governments - and win," he said sardonically, as a few chuckles rose from the 100 delegates.

"The only other realistic option we had was to negotiate" for a compromise with the two governments, ceding some of the territory in return for a settlement, Moore said.

The council got their consensus and eventually their land, or at least almost 24,000 square kilometres of it, in 1976 in what is called a modern-day treaty.

An agreement-in-principle on the claim is expected to be complete this year.

But the process has taken decades and the final goal of self-sufficiency for the Nisga'a is still a long way off.

Before negotiations began some of the members also expected that the tribal council would get the land and self-government and "in a few months become millionaires and live happily every after," said Moore.

He related the anecdotes to explain to the delegates, who were negotiating or preparing claims of their own, the need to set realistic goals. And to warn them not to expect instant or complete success.

Restructuring

The Nisga'a started by organizing their internal structures after deciding to have one tribal council represent the position of the four tribal groups in talks with the government.

"The hereditary chiefs decided to put everything in the same bowl because the Nisga'a all eat from the same bowl," explained Moore.

"All Nisga'a people would share equally."

The people voted members to a general executive board that included the negotiating team and several committees, said his colleague, Steve Azak.

The council hired consultants and lawyers and prepared budgets to get from Ottawa the money needed to fight the claim.

"There's a great deal of money involved in the land question issue," said Azak.

Erlling Christensen, senior adviser to the Lheit Lit'en Nation in B.C., explained that the self-determination process is grounded in restructuring, development and healing at the community level.

Getting a clear mandate on what to negotiate is important, he added.

For instance, members of his nation when asked if they would be in favor of sharing resources on their land with non-Natives voted 54 per cent against the proposal.

But when asked if they would agree to entering into joint ventures with non-Native Corporation, which amounts to the same thing, almost all members said they supported the idea, he said.

Other speakers said preparation for a claim begins with documenting the right to land, using anthropology and archeology.

Those are the tools needed go help stake territory and prove the claim, said Art Sterrit, president of the Tsimshian Tribal Council.

"We do have valid claims based on at least 10,000 years of settlement in the area," he said. "We knew we were there, but sometimes we need something tangible, something to prove to non-natives that we were there."

In one instance, archaeologists unearthed a 3,000 year-old basket in the unmistakable style of the Tsimshian in a wet site the council could include in their land claim, he said.

Document land

But natives can't rely on non-natives to do the studies on their land because history is distorted from a white's perspective, he said.

"The only way is for first nations to do their own studies...because many of our people will never share the most secret aspects of Native life. Never have and never

will," he said.

And Jim Aldridge, a lawyer who acts as counsel for the Nisga'a, xplained how

to prepare a claim by assessing physical characteristics of the territory and estimating revenues.

Resources analyses can provide the important intimate knowledge of the land needed in a claim, he said.

They provide a measuring stick for sharing resources, for evaluating compensation for resources wrongly taken in the past, and to calculate future revenues, said Aldridge.

"It's important for Natives to understand the government's evaluation and it's important for governments to understand the Natives' evaluation of the land," he said.

"You don't have to agree, but you can bring (the evaluations) to negotiation" to arrive at a compromise.

Delegates also heard from representatives of third party interests, such as municipalities and corporations, and how they will be affected by land claims.

The city of Whitehorse in Yukon was built on the traditional lands of the Kwanlin Dun and the Ta'an Kwa'chan.

When their claim is complete, they could be two of the largest landowners in the area, said Kathy Watson, a city councillor.

Natives and the city will have to sort out jurisdictional overlap, determine who will provide municipal services, how they will be paid for, and what role the city will play in the area.

Third party interest

Another third-party interest, MacMillan Bloedel foresters, said lumber companies do not oppose the land claim process.

And logging companies view it as preferable to costly court battles that polarize sides, said John Howard, the company's lawyer.

But a number of issues have to be settled, he said, including how and to which communities to distribute compensation and what form it will take and who pays it.

And it has to be determined if companies adversely affected by a claim are eligible for compensation themselves, he said.

The two-day conference was organized by the Native Investment and Trade Association, and also dealt with the difference between comprehensive and specific claims, the new B.C. Treaty Commissionand bargaining techniques.