Needs on hold while band pays down debt

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It is quieter now on Webequie First Nation than in mid-July when a rash of suicides brought a flurry of outside visitors to the beleaguered reserve 480 km northwest of Thunder Bay.

First Nations and First Nation organizations stepped in to do what they could.

But calls for substantive government action to solve the problems blamed for creating the suicide epidemic have not changed much in the community, although at the provincial level at least, some are listening and offering support.

Last month, Webequie's Chief Scott Jacob said, "There has been some response ... we had Minister (of Health and Long-Term Care) George Smitherman for the Province of Ontario for help, who was in here on Aug. 8 to visit the community."

Between May 1, 2004 and July 8, four suicide deaths occurred in the fly-in community. Three in just one week in July. As well as the suicides on July 1, 3 and 6, four women and girls aged 14 to 22 attempted suicide and had to be taken out by medivac to hospital for a psychological assessment.

The overwhelmed community of 670 residents, half of whom are youth, turned to the outside world for grief and intervention counsellors and programs.

At the time, Matawa First Nations Management Tribal Chair Bentley Cheechoo broadcast the situation as an emergency and said "We are looking for INAC and Health Canada to step up to the plate and provide the proper assistance."

In mid-July, Smitherman announced the Ontario government was providing $30,000 to assist Webequie to develop a community approach to recovery and healing.

"The community is hurting and we want to support them in their hour of need," said Smitherman then.

The chief said much of that money went to pay expenses incurred in bringing grieving community members who live in Thunder Bay home.

"The cost of bringing them in ... a plane load is around over six grand.

"Plus on top of that, we have to consider the funeral costs and everything."

Health Canada's help has been slower coming than the province.

On Aug. 18 Jacob said, "I believe Health Canada are still working out some details in terms of how they're going to help us, and we've had a lot of calls from them too in terms of how they want to help.

"And there has been some other ministers; especially the province has been there for us."

In August Jacob met with Minister of Northern Development and Mines Rick Bartolucci in Sudbury. Bartolucci had visited Webequie last May.

"We kind of gave him a picture of a life, the daily struggle that we have to go through living up here, the cost of living up here and all that. ...Since then he has been talking to the provincial cabinet ministers in terms of how they should come up this way and visit us and find out first-hand what these people go through. Not just our community, but (other northern First Nations)."

It doesn't help that the cost of living in the area is "four times what it is in Toronto."

Jacob added, "I don't think 30 grand will help solve the problems that we have today ... the problems that we have, have been there since whenever this community was established."

Jacob also said that Webequie being "in a co-management situation" and likely to remain so for another couple of years, is limited in what it can do to improve community infrastructure and create jobs. "We've had a lot of struggles here ... trying to get out of the co-management," he said.

The chief pointed out reason for despair in the community. He said it would take "hours" to relate all the problems, but housing is just one of them.

"It's really hard to do any work on the First Nation houses and all that, because currently we have a lot of houses that are substandard, and it shouldn't have to be like that if we're living in Canada or Ontario."

This summer, the community renewed its demands that housing be given priority by government. The community has been in a deficit position since the reserve was created.

"I guss one of the other contributing factors to all of this in terms of the financial situation for the whole First Nation is that back a few years ago we finally got our reserve status . . . February 2001. We never had any access to any funding; because we didn't have no reserve status we ended up using our housing dollars to do these 20 years of negotiations with the province and Canada to get our reserve status. And this is something ... that contributes to why we are in co-management. We're lucky not to be in third (party management) right now."

When the cluster of suicides occurred, Ontario let it be known it already had committed $1.2 million through its Aboriginal Healing and Wellness Strategy to Nishnawbe Aski Nation, the political organization that serves 50 First Nations in Northern Ontario, including Webequie. Last May, the province announced an additional $5 million for the strategy.

Asked how much Healing and Wellness money Webequie would see, the chief responded, "That's a good question." He said some had been allocated to a program Webequie has in place to deal with residential school issues, but no Healing and Wellness funds have been allocated to deal with youth suicides. The program is "very strict" about how that money is used, he said. "I think it doesn't really cover what's happened with our community."