Mountie makes history

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After 28 years, Constable Wesley Steinhauer retired. He was the longest serving First Nation member of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) in Alberta.

Steinhauer has mixed feelings about putting the job behind him.

"There's a lot connected to this job. There's a lot of responsibility. Because you are a policeman, you're a policeman 24 hours of the day. And it's going to be hard to walk away from that because you're conditioned, of course, to live and think that way all the time," said Steinhauer during an interview with Alberta Sweetgrass just one day before he would hang up his hat. "I'm going to miss it, and I'm not going to miss it."

Constable Ken Dionne of the Kehewin Cree Nation describes Steinhauer as a humble man.

"He loves horses and he loves planes, and he's a very quiet man," said Dionne, who thinks of Steinhauer as a mentor.

"He's been in it so long; he actually gives me advice on what to do, what not to do .... He's been very instrumental in helping me, even though I have 18 years service."

Steinhauer, a Saddle Lake First Nation member, joined the RCMP in 1977 as an Indian special constable. The special constable program began in 1974 as part of the RCMP's efforts to hire Native people to police Native communities. Although most saw it as a step in the right direction, it wasn't until June 1991 that Steinhauer was paid the same as a regular member of the RCMP. That was when the RCMP changed the Indian special constable program into the First Nations policing policy.

"It was a conversion program and so you had to go back to Regina, train. It was further training again, and then you were qualified as a regular member. It didn't make any sense, but that's the stage where we're at now, and we are now regular members," Steinhauer explained.

Dionne said Steinhauer's 28 years of service is a milestone for First Nation people, explaining that the RCMP are protectors of Treaty 6, signed in Sept. 9, 1876.

"So the Red Coats will protect us," said Dionne. One of the mandates given to the North-West Mounted Police, the predecessor of the RCMP, by then-prime minister John A. Macdonald was to establish peaceful relations with First Nations people as setters arrived.

Throughout his career, Steinhauer has served in St. Paul, the Western Arctic, Hobbema, and the Edmonton Air Section.

His most recent posting was at Edmonton International Airport, and it was early on in that position that Canada customs asked him to help with a situation involving a Native person. He knew then that he had to educate both Native people and customs officers about Native rights and responsibilities.

After the events of 9/11, Steinhauer said many Native people struggled to understand the new regulations when crossing the border. Steinhauer worked on an educational poster for Native people about border crossing. He also brought Canadian and United States customs and immigration officers and the RCMP to Saddle Lake for a presentation to the community to help them understand the rights and the new security rules when crossing into the U.S.

"He's done some breaking ground in bringing these people together and coming onto a First Nation reserve and actually explaining to First Nation people what the new regulations are," said Dionne.

Constable Wesley Steinhauer started flying in 1981.

"Aircraft, when I was stationed at St. Paul, would come out on occasion to do searches and stuff like that for stolen vehicles or persons lost in the bush ... and because I knew the area they used to ask me to come up and [fly with them]," he said.

He started in the back of the plane as a spotter, then worked his way up to the front, and that's when he developed a love of flying. "[I] realized it was a challenging interesting field, so that's where I started to pursue it."

Steinhauer is also a man with a strong appreciation for people and culture, said Constable Ken Dionne.

"He understands people uite well. He's a hard worker and he respects all aspects of our culture."

Steinhauer said he would miss the people and culture the most, but he's got some idea of how he will keep busy.

"I'm not sure what exactly I'm going to do right now, but if I had a choice, I would go out into the bush," he said, referring to the camp for troubled Native kids he runs with his partner Barry Barker. The camp for Aboriginal children is 18 kilometres west of Nordegg and has 30 horses.

"A lot of these kids are from inner city and a lot of them don't know where they come from. They look in a mirror and they see a Native person but they don't understand what it means." The camp reintroduces the kids to their culture; and offers the campers the opportunity to talk to Elders, counsellors and their peers.