Marten Falls and Webequie pursue their socio-economic development goals in shepherding Northern Road Link environmental impact process
If your First Nation community harbours great ambitions to become a major project proponent, Gordon Wabasse offers some sage and simple advice.Wabasse, the lands and resources director of Webequie First Nation, participated in a panel discussion on the Ring of Fire at the inaugural Indigenous-led Projects Forum in Toronto, Sept. 27.
“We do have rights, too. We’re Indigenous proponents. We have every right to practise and pursue own our economic development, and I respect that, and that’s what the other communities should expect. Together with neighbouring Marten Falls First Nation to the south, they are collaborating on a longer road system called the Northern Road Link, a shared project that involves Marten Falls getting its own community access road. The Link would connect the Webequie road with the 200-kilometre Marten Falls-to-Aroland road.
But if government and mining want access to minerals in the Far North, and if the transportation infrastructure crosses their traditional lands, Achneepineskum said, “we have to be first and foremost at the table” to have a say in what will happen and how it will unfold. That started the process of the short-lived Regional Framework Agreement that ultimately died with the Wynne government. But the spirit of Indigenous participation continues under the Ford government with the funding of the environmental assessment processes led by the communities and their environmental and infrastructure consultants, AECOM.
Once there was consensus to proceed to the road EA stage, the highly detailed process forced them to take stock of the water, air and what exists on the land. It meant regular meetings with the community — made challenging by the pandemic — to ask what they thought about the road and how to plan a route that avoids culturally significant places.
Through a combination of Western science with traditional knowledge and values, Achneepineskum added they are “setting the bar high” in guiding the road EA projects, incorporating time-honoured Anishnaabe principles to move the project along while respecting the concerns of their First Nation community neighbours.
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