Housing problems addressed at AFN conference

Page 2

The Assembly of First Nations and the department of Indian affairs can agree on one thing - on-reserve housing is woefully inadequate leading to serious social problems.

According to an Indian Affairs fact sheet, on-reserve housing is "among the worst in Canada." To address this crisis, the AFN hosted a First Nations housing conference in Toronto on March 9 and 10. More than 600 delegates from across Canada with 45 corporate booth participants attended to share ideas on financing, constructing and maintaining houses on reserve.

#Philosophical fractures, however, appeared almost immediately during the conference's opening remarks. Marilyn Buffalo, president of the Native Women's Association of Canada, derided the male-dominated organizations for ignoring the fact that 90 per cent of Aboriginal single-parent homes are led by women, making the issue of social housing a women's issue.

Marilyn Buffalo

Photo: Ken Williams

National Chief Phil Fontaine and Ontario vice-chief Tom Bressette, stessed that housing was a matter of resource control, employment and treaty rights.

"Treaty obligations have not been met by governments," said Fontaine. He also attacked the willingness of bureaucrats to seek the easiest means to solve the housing crisis.

"It is easier to fill out a form than it is to figure out how communities can use the resources that are already there," he said.

To back up his assertion, Fontaine described how First Nations in Manitoba are usually forced into dealing with construction companies from Winnipeg that get their building materials from Vancouver, even though construction-quality timber is available right next to the communities. But these communities cannot cut or mill the timber because it is owned by the province.

Bressette, as well, described the frustrations of Northern Ontario First Nations that watch as truckloads of timber are shipped out of their treaty territories without any financial compensation or employment opportunities.

#Jane Stewart, minister of Indian affairs, was invited to the conference but was unable to attend because of Parliamentary obligations. Her Parliamentary secretary used the conference to announce an additional $20 million in housing funding to 74 First Nations, increasing the department's housing investment to about $200 million for this year. The announcement was warmly received by the delegates, but, to some, it was considered a Band-Aid solution.

Phil Fontaine

Photo: Ken Williams

According to Indian affairs' own statistics, about 36,000 of the current 76,000 houses on-reserve are in serious need of repair, while an additional 5,275 need to be replaced.

Peter Broeren of Guildcrest Building Corporation, a builder of pre-fabricated houses, said "as a Canadian, it's embarrassing, it's humiliating to see some of the conditions that exist in First Nations communities."

Guildcrest has built more than 100 homes in First Nations communities throughout Ontario over the past two years. Broern said his perception of First Nations people changed dramatically after working in their communities.

"I've seen an 800-sq. ft house with 17 people living in it," he said. The northern communities give you a much better sense as to how serious the problem is, he said.

Good housing means that children had their own space for homework and that it improved their grades in school. When as many as three generations live in one house, there is little space or time for homework. The future of the community improves with good housing.

Financing housing programs had always been under the control of Indian Affairs. Individuals who wished to buy houses on-reserve were refused mortgages from banks because the Indian Act prevented seizure of reserve land or using it as collateral. The Royal Bank has found a way around this problem, even though Indian Affairs still holds the purse strings.

As long as an individual on a reserve can get the band's housing authority to act as a guarantor, he Royal Bank would be willing to consider that person for a home loan.

Peter Montgomery, manager of public sector and Aboriginal business for Royal Bank, said the pilot project on four communities has been an incredible success. The project has $10 million in loans with only a couple of instances of defaults, and well below the banks tolerance for bad loans. With this success, the bank plans to make this program national.

But the program will only apply to financially sound First Nations and still doesn't address the larger housing crisis.

Holly Johns from the Samson Cree Nation in Alberta still thinks that reserve land should remain band owned, but also feels that Indian Affairs shouldn't be solely responsible for housing. This, she said, will allow bands to seek other opportunities to solve their housing needs. Even though she recognized that conferences such as this were valuable and new ideas were emerging, the housing situation on reserves was intolerable.

"A lack of adequate housing means people are forced to leave their communities and live in the cities," she said. And that, as Marilyn Buffalo mentioned in her opening remarks, means that more First Nations people are being lost to the streets.