AFN re-structuring finances, bumpy road ahead

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The Assembly of First Nations is going through a difficult and at times painful reorganization after reductions in the funding it receives from the Department of Indian Affairs forced the layoff of 70 employees.

As federal government adds more support staff and hires consultants to advise the Indian Affairs minister in his public relations war with the AFN over governance, the AFN is forced to down size and is faced with the task of finding creative ways to do more with less.

At the Ottawa Confederacy of Nations in early December, Northwest Territories Vice-chief Bill Erasmus told the chiefs the organization could be facing a $1.18 million deficit by the end of the fiscal year, although he added that "with a little arm twisting and a few miracles, we may not have deficit."

Erasmus said it was important to get next year's funding negotiations out of the way as soon as possible, adding he hoped to have the job done by January.

Comments attributed to officials close to Minister Robert Nault in a National Post story on Dec. 18 make the AFN's future financial situation even more precarious. The senior government official suggests the minister is fed up with the AFN's unwillingness to go along with his attempts to reform the Indian Act and may decide to shift funding to other national Aboriginal organizations.

The October staffing cuts have not completely solved the financial crunch. The chiefs' organization is already looking at leasing out some of the now vacant space in its Ottawa headquarters and the executive announced on Dec. 5 that it will triple the administrative cut it takes from program dollars from five per cent to 15 in the next fiscal year.

Reporters were kept out of about half of the Confederacy meeting, but one source told Raven's Eye that an Elder suggested the executive members take a pay cut to help ease the financial pressure.

Vice-chiefs' earnings were previously not disclosed by the organization, but one former AFN employee who believes too much money is absorbed through salaries and not enough is targeted at the basic issues important to grassroots people, provided detailed numbers about the vice-chiefs' earnings and expenditures.

A document entitled "Schedule of remuneration -Vice-chief's offices" said that a total of $1,755,566.40 was dispersed to the 10 vice-chiefs in the last fiscal year. The base salary is identified as $90,000 each. That is augmented by $3,071.88 in benefits, $3,461.54 in a severance allowance and $15,000 for travel expenses. Northern vice-chiefs Bill Erasmus and Mary Jane Jim (Yukon) are reported to receive an extra $6,600 for travel.

The document also states that all the vice-chiefs also receive money to hire two staff members: the first earns $40,000, the second, $32,000.

AFN Chief Executive Officer Dan Brant said the document was authentic, but was an un-revised version. In the final version of the audited financial statement, the total figure for vice-chief spending was $1,689,580, he said. He also said that the second staff position was eliminated in October, a savings of $320,000 in the year to come.

Former AFN employees made several allegations with relation to some vice-chiefs who the sources say rarely attend meetings. One source told us executive committee minutes called "records of decision" would show exactly who attended and who didn't, allowing us to verify or dismiss those allegations. But the AFN refused to disclose those records.

Raven's Eye e-mailed all the allegations made by former employees to all the vice-chiefs on Dec. 14, five working days before our deadline. Copies of the e-mail were also sent to Brant, the national chief's office and the AFN communications unit. We received responses from communications staffer Monica Ille, Brant and two vice-chiefs- Manitoba's Ken Young and British Columbia's Satsan Herb George.

"I have nothing to be embarrassed about my salary. I'm qualified to earn the salary that I'm earning," said Young, who hols a law degree.

George simply stated that the figure was correct. When we asked for the names and salaries of the people on his staff who are funded by the national office, George pointed out that only one person was in that category as a result of the cuts.

"While the salaries of publicly elected officials should withstand public scrutiny, the B.C. AFN respects the privacy of its two staff members and will not release names or salaries," George said in a written statement.

Young rejected the allegations that some executive members don't pull their weight.

"The other guys, they put out. They work," he said.

Some vice-chiefs receive these salaries on top of the salaries they get from other positions they hold in their regions. Young said former national chief Phil Fontaine pushed for a raise in salary for himself and the vice-chiefs, in part to eliminate the need for a vice-chief to hold a second job.

"The reason why the former national chief structured the salary that way was because, at the rate that they were getting paid, at $55,000, quite a few of them were moonlighting to make ends meet," he said. "So what he did was he went and negotiated with the federal government, with the minister of the day, for appropriate funding so that the vice-chiefs, the executive of the AFN, could earn the salary relevant to that position. So far as the national chief's salary, that's a determination made by the chiefs. A resolution was passed in Toronto increasing the salary to what you say it is, $125,000, and if the chiefs want to lower it, they'll do so at an assembly."

Young said the vice-chiefs are working at the same level as, and are frequently in competition with, government officials who make significantly more in terms of salary, benefits, perks, and staff support.

"On the finance stuff, it would be fair if you compared. The government, they're not free from being looked at in terms of salary structures. I mean, the minister, with all due respect, he has taken shot at the organization and you look at his office and the support that he has right across the country. He comes to Winnipeg and he has all of the regional office there to look after him. If he goes to Ontario, the same thing. We don't have that kind of capacity. Absolutely not! And he has big capacity here too. For him to take potshots at the organization and attack it fiscally and make it look like it's a non-entity, that's not fair and that's not respectful either," he said. "I don't know how much money his unit eats up there but he has a political office. And they have an unlimited budget in my view."

Akwesasne Grand Chief Mike Mitchell caused a bit of a stir during the Confederacy when he took issue with the raise in administrative fees the AFN will take out of program funding.

"Now, if it's a matter of strategizing where those monies are going to go that we have AFN administer and take some money off the top, perfectly understandable. But if you continue to take . . . I tell you what it's going to mean; we're going to have to lay off some further staff at AFN. That's the end result," he said.

The suggestion by an influential chief like Mitchell that the AFN should start cutting its spending rather than take money from program dollars was seen by many observers as a veiled shot at the level of compensation within the organization. Young saw it as more of a complaint that the executive made the decision without consulting the chiefs' committee that was affected.

"I didn't see Mike Mitchell's comments as being an attack on the organization. I think what he wanted was information relating to a percentage of the health budget being used for administrative purposes. The executive had taken the position that the percentage that was being used at the moment was too low and we had passed at resolution at the executive meeting to up it. Mike felt that the communication was not there for the chiefs that were sitting on the committee," Young said. "And he had a point, ut nonetheless we the executive have to sometimes take positions that are not popular. They have to be made based on fiscal reality and the fiscal realities at the AFN are ones that are not super."

Allegations were also made that the vice-chief staffing dollars are not always spent on staff. Young said the regions have to go through an auditing process that would detect that kind of thing and there's been no indication of it.

"If there's money that's not being used for purposes for which it was placed into the hands of the national organization, the executive will deal with that. At the moment we don't have any information that would cause us to believe an investigation is warranted in that regard. If there is information, we would of course require the financial people to bring it forward," he said.

The reorganization has clearly angered some people who found themselves without employment. Some of the criticisms leveled at the AFN are legitimate and some aren't, Young said. Most of the housing directorate staff was laid off despite the huge need for work on the housing front for First Nations. Former employees see that as a sign some of the cuts were made with a hidden agenda in mind.

"The housing unit is mine; I'm glad you asked. I took exception to that," Young said. "I think there should have been a lot more thought given to the way the layoffs were implemented. The unit should not have been gutted to the point where there was no staff there. That's an in-house problem that we've addressed. We've addressed it but nonetheless it's been done and the administration has taken a position and we as an executive have expressed our disappointment in the way some of the layoffs were handled."

CEO Dan Brant had to make most of the tough decisions regarding layoffs. As the top non-political staff member in the organization, he has powers that exceed the national chief's when it comes to employee relations.

"Nothing has been cut," Brant said. "We are still trying to