Parcel of land is root of contention on Six Nations
CALEDONIA — Kristine Hill drives her mud-caked pickup truck through a bucolic parcel of farmland, where she has cultivated an assortment of crops such as beans, flint corn and tobacco.
Most of the bounty makes its way back to Hill’s home of Six Nations of the Grand River and some of the yield is used for traditional ceremonies, she said.
All of this hangs in jeopardy, however. The 52-year-old Mohawk woman last month was handed an unsigned letter from the Six Nations Elected Band Council, instructing her to vacate the area — just west of the reserve’s boundary — or face legal action.
The band council stayed true to its word. Hill, who has farmed the parcel for about three years, faces an injunction.
The case is before the Superior Court of Justice, Ontario’s Ministry of Indigenous Relations and Reconciliation confirmed via email.
“It was very disheartening and frustrating,” said Hill. “It’s that basic question: ‘Why me?’ This property is supposed to be held for the people.”
She is caught in the crossfire of infighting between the band council and the Haudenosaunee Confederacy Chiefs Council — a historic government system made up of five First Nations — which issued a five-year lease to Hill to farm the land.
The confederacy wants the area to be independent from the Canadian government in case it’s expropriated. Once a tract of land is given reserve status, the Crown becomes the title holder.
“They (the band council) want it turned into reserve lands under Canada’s Indian Act, and that’s not how those lands were to come back,” said Mohawk Chief Allen MacNaughton.
MacNaughton is referring to negotiations between Six Nations and Ontario in 2006 during the climax of the Caledonia standoff, whereby First Nation people erected blockades and occupied a housing development called the Douglas Creek Estates.
Ontario attempted to pacify tensions by transferring land, including the 381-acre “Burtch lands,” back to Six Nations.
A former jail on the property was razed and multi-year environmental remediation was undertaken to clean up soil contaminated by asbestos, which the confederacy helped with, said MacNaughton.
The band council is refusing to acknowledge the arrangement but the confederacy won’t be swayed, he said.
“We will continue to honour that lease,” said MacNaughton.
“It’s a power play because the band council has known that the confederacy has managed that land for the past 10 years.”
A 2006 letter signed by former Ontario premier David Peterson and addressed to the confederacy states that:
“The title of the Burtch lands will be included in the lands rights process of the Haudenosaunee/ Six Nations/Canada/Ontario. It is the intention that the land title be returned to its original state, its status under the Haldimand Proclamation of 1784.”
“The proclamation stated the lands are ours to enjoy basically forever ... as long as the grass grows and water flows,” said MacNaughton.
“That agreement was struck in order to take the barricades down at Caledonia and for those Burtch lands to be returned under those terms. In the end, the confederacy said they will be farmlands.”
Indigenous Relations and Reconciliation Minister David Zimmer did not respond to requests for comment.
“The use of the land is now a matter internal to the Six Nations community,” a media relations co-ordinator wrote via email. “As the matter is before the courts, any further comment would be inappropriate.”
A federal corporation was established by the band council in late March to amalgamate the Burtch lands. And it’s holding the land in trust until it gains reserve status.
The parcel is sought after by the band council for agricultural purposes, said Lonny Bomberry, director of lands and resources at Six Nations, who is overseeing the trust. “Six Nations elected council and the corporation are saying they’re entitled to the property and that (Hill) is illegally there, trespassing, and are getting a court order to have her removed,” he said.
“(Ontario) said they were returning the land to Six Nations; they didn’t say to the confederacy. The confederacy doesn’t own the land, so I don’t know how you can have the authority to give a lease to anybody. It’s just all self-serving action by them.”
Issues like these have had a tendency to “rear their heads” ever since 1924, when confederacy chiefs were replaced by an elected system under the Indian Act, he added.
“Everybody puts a different slant on it,” said Bomberry, adding that the elected council and the confederacy alike were negotiating with the province.
“Elected council gave the confederacy the authority to negotiate a resolution (of Douglas Creek Estates).”
Hill appears unfazed as she describes the land snafu, comparing it to an irksome mosquito.
“From my perspective, I continue,” she said. “I have a significant investment in this property.
“(The band council) knew I had a lease because it was public information, and decisions were made without consulting the community
“Ontario is maintaining their hold on the reins and they’re using the Six Nations elected council to do it. I didn’t believe my fight would be with my own people.”