Local Aboriginal organizations aren’t reeling from federal budget cuts – but that could be because they don’t have all the details.

“We don’t know yet. We have to go on faith right now,” said Lee Anne Ireland, executive director with the Urban Society for Aboriginal Youth in Calgary. “We apply (for funding) in September or October and often times we have to run the programs blind from April to August and then we know if we got the funding or not.”

The Artisan Gardens that pay tribute to First Nations at the Bow Valley Ranche historic site represent the final phase of a heritage project begun in 1995.

When Mitzie Wasyliw and husband Larry rescued the Bow Valley Ranche House from demolition, they had no idea that the work begun on the house would eventually lead to the commemorative gardens.

“Restoring the house itself was a huge endeavour,” said Mitzie Wasyliw.

Plans to build both affordable housing and market housing for the Métis community are delayed but not dead even though the land originally purchased to help finance the venture can no longer be used.

Shelley Wegner, project manager for Kanata Métis Cultural Enterprises Ltd., said they are entertaining both private offers for the land, located in Edmonton’s River Valley, as well as a land swap with the city.

“It’s very preliminary,” said Wegner. “We’re not anywhere close to negotiating price. We’re quite far apart on the city’s appraisal and our appraised value.”

The March federal budget offered no additional dollars for women’s shelters on reserves but Carolyn Goard, director of member programs and services for the Alberta Council of Women’s Shelters, is “cautiously optimistic” that the government hasn’t forgotten women and children who live in violence.

The budget did include an increase of $11.9 million for family prevention programs on First Nations.

Goard is hopeful some of that funding will be allocated to on-reserve shelters for programming.

Keith Chief Moon, of Kainai First Nation, is from a large family of 12 who took care of one another. Then came the race to convert his parents and send the children off to residential school.

Mom was swayed to the Catholics and dad to the Anglicans. The result was a chaotic and tension-filled life in residential school.

“The abuse kicked in in Catholic school, because we were not supposed to be there,” he said of the religious divide. That abuse ran the gamut of sexual, physical, emotional and spiritual harm.

A new approach to helping Aboriginal children in care and their families began last month in the Edmonton region.

Money budgeted by Region 6 to deliver services to Aboriginal children brought into care as of April 1 has been passed along to Kahkiyaw, a partnership formed between Bent Arrow Healing Society and Boyle Street Community Services.

An overwhelming victory by Alison Redford and the Progressive Conservatives was a surprise, admits Driftpile Chief Rose Laboucan, who is hopeful it won’t mean the same old same old for First Nations.

“I’m hoping that the premier will have an open mind when it comes to working with First Nations people. Regardless of who is the premier, we are part of Alberta … and they should have to come to terms with working with us at some point,” said Laboucan, who admits to being impressed with Danielle Smith both in a personal meeting with her and in an APTN interview Smith gave.

Chiefs of the Yinka Dene Alliance of British Columbia, who gathered on the steps of the Alberta Legislature on May 2 and spoke out against Enbridge’s Northern Gateway Pipeline, were not joined by Alberta chiefs.

It was not a slight, said Eriel Deranger, who moderated the day’s activities, but a conflict in scheduling. She said many Alberta chiefs took part in the feast the night before but could not join in the press conference or the march that took about 70 protestors to the Enbridge building on Jasper avenue in downtown Edmonton.

On March 31st, after two years of preparation by his extended family, Maxwxwadziy, Chief George Shaughnessy conducted a Kwixella to memorialize 5 family members and to name those born since his last potlatch in Alert Bay in 2006. The Kwixella, which is a type of potlatch a Chief can conduct if he has already initiated his main dancers in previous potlatches, was held at Wawadit'la (Mungo Martin Bighouse) in Victoria, BC. Chief Shaughnessy has potlached three times and has held several feasts and ceremonies in both Alert Bay and Victoria.

The Yinka Dene Alliance, a group of British Columbia First Nations that has used its laws to ban the proposed Enbridge Northern Gateway pipelines and tankers in their territories, announced April 24 that it will embark on a “Freedom Train” journey beginning April 30. The goal is to protect their rights and their freedom from the threat of oil spills. The journey starts at Jasper in Alberta and ends May 9 in Toronto where Enbridge’s corporate leaders will be attending an annual shareholders meeting.