Tribal council, wildlife group pact will educate
Initiative gives Indigenous youth chance to train in archery as well as shooting
A partnership between the Saskatoon Tribal Council and Saskatoon Wildlife Federation is expected to enhance educational opportunities for Indigenous youth and support their treaty rights to hunt, trap and fish.
The Saskatoon Tribal Council and Saskatoon Wildlife Federation will be signing a memorandum of understanding (MOU) cementing the agreement on Thursday.
Tribal Chief Mark Arcand said the federation’s respect for the treaty-inherent rights led to a broader dialogue opening up. It soon centred around how to support youth training for the North American Indigenous Games, particularly those competing in archery and shooting events.
The federation offered up its facility and had coaches provide junior archery and junior rifle training to the athletes.
The MOU is expected to open up opportunities for the federation’s programming to be taken the STC’S seven member First Nations or for youth from the communities to take part in programming at the federation’s facility.
The focus for the STC as the two parties worked toward the MOU has been on knocking down barriers through education.
Arcand said hunting, trapping and fishing represent a livelihood from a First Nations perspective. “If the community doesn’t have the opportunity to learn from their own people, here’s an opportunity that actually enhances the education piece,” he added.
“At the end of the day, it’s pretty awesome to see that we have an organization that wants to reach out and support some of our values as First Nations people.”
Saskatoon Wildlife Federation president Robert Freberg said the MOU had been in the works for about 14 months. He said the main objective is to start to form a strong basis for reconciliation and a framework to move forward on mutually beneficial initiatives.
“One of the things we realized very early on in the process is that we both have a strong connection to nature, the outdoors, youth and education and we wanted to use the best practices of both organizations to bring those values to young people in our community here in Saskatoon,” Freberg said.
While recent history in Saskatchewan — the death of Colten Boushie in 2016 and rising concerns around rural property crime and trespass laws — wasn’t top of mind for either party to the MOU, Freberg said it drove home the need for both sides to understand each other. He said the MOU won’t solve such issues, but it will bring both parties’ values together in an urban setting.
The SWF’S involvement with the STC goes beyond educational opportunities. The federation is one of the organizations that has helped the STC provide lunches to youth at the White Buffalo Youth Lodge in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The SWF is looking at other opportunities to build on the relationship with the tribal council, including possibly building a new interpretive centre in the Northeast Swale area. There is also talk of building a lodge for Elders and a sweat lodge near the federation’s facility.
Arcand lauded the Saskatoon Wildlife Federation’s future plans.
“Imagine if every organization in the city had some kind of opportunity to be partnering with First Nations organizations to really enhance the process to learn from each other,” he said.