Committee Members Present:

• Chad Collins (chair)
• Dave Braden
• Murray Ferguson
• Margaret McCarthy
• Sam Merulla
• Dave Mitchell

Committee Members Absent:

• Phil Bruckler
• Tom Jackson

Non-Members Present:

• Brian McHattie

Media Present:

• Eric McGuiness (Spectator)
• Maggie Hughes (View/CFMU)
• Richard Leitner (Brabant)
• Kevin Werner (Brabant)

8.      Staff Presentations

8.2               Haudenosaunee - Hamilton Red Hill Agreements (PW04055) - (City Wide)
www.hamilton.ca/Clerk/agendas-minutes-reports/
public-works/2004/May17/PW04055.pdf

Presentation by:
Chris Murray, Acting Director, Red Hill Valley Project
Guy Paparella, Director, Strategic Initiatives

Chris Murray: "I'm going to provide a 10-15 min presentation regarding the agreements. There are essentially 3 main items: history (steps that have led to where we are right now), the agreements themselves and thirdly the recommendations that are before you now.

With respect to the history, March 2002 there was a letter addressed to Mayor Wade which made clear the concerns that the Haudenosaunee Environment Committee had with respect to the project.

In August 2002 there was a meeting at King's Forest with Chief Jamieson as well as representatives of the Confederacy Council to understand what it is that the City is doing with respect to the project.

Shortly after in September 2002 it was clear that Six Nations wanted more involvement in terms of the archaeological work that we were undertaking so it was at that time that we agreed that we would sponsor a particular monitor with our archaeological crews to ensure that we were doing the work properly.

In December 2002 as requested by Chief Jamieson we retained a facilitator to ensure that our negotiations moved forward in a respectful way and so that individual was brought on board.

In July 2003 you'll recall that the Mayor was given the authority to sign a negotiation agreement with Chief Jamieson. And then following that in August of 2003 the Confederacy Council received a letter from Chief Jamieson making clear her support for them moving forward and take a more proactive leadership role in the resolution of key issues.

January 2004 the Confederacy Council approved the City of Hamilton-Haudenosaunee agreements and then as you know, in February 2004 we brought this matter before the Expressway Implementation Committee.

The agreements themselves are as follows:

• Facilitation Agreement
• General Agreement
• Joint Stewardship Agreement
• Burials & Archaeology Agreement
• Hunting, Fishing, Trapping & Gathering Agreement
• Tolls Agreement
• Medicine Plant Agreement
• Economic Opportunities Agreement
• Human Heritage Agreement

I'm going to just deal with each one very briefly.

In terms of the Facilitation Agreement , the first point to stress is that it sets out rules for negotiation. That agreement involved a facilitator to ensure that all the issues were addressed. When the negotiations are complete - that agreement is effectively ended.

With respect to the General Agreement , it acts in many respects as an umbrella agreement to all the other agreements. So it spells out why it is that we're working together and what the basic principles of our relationship amount to. It is not a treaty. But it certainly looks at the principles of the various treaty interests of Six Nations and finds a way to address them in a respectful way. And this agreement and all the sub-agreements cannot be used in a court of law.

In terms of the Joint Stewardship Agreement , the board will involve 6 members, 3 from the Haudenosaunee and 3 from the City of Hamilton. The board is there to help develop a Master plan for the Valley to help ensure not only that the project is implemented but to help ensure that the ecological work is undertaken as planned.

In terms of the Burials & Archaeology Agreement , it describes the procedure that City and Six Nations would follow if a burial site were found. What you'll find is that it exceeds what we're required to do provincially.

Six Nations will be present in all archaeological work so it ensures that there will be monitoring of all our work as we move forward.

It also addresses the fact that artefacts, after they have been processed by archaelogists following the requirements of the Province, will be returned to the community.

The Hunting, Fishing, Trapping & Gathering Agreement speaks directly to Haudenosaunee rights and ensures that those rights will continue. As well, the overseer of the agreement will be the Joint Board. It is clear that hunting, fishing, trapping & gathering does present, in an urban context, some potential challenges which is going to be fully respected by all

Parties meaning simply that the issue of safety and conservation is paramount. No one is suggesting that there will be any firearms fired off in the City. It is just there to ensure that what was covered by treaties sometime ago is still respected.

The Tolls Agreement is somewhat of a moot point in light of decisions of this Council, but the agreement speaks to the fact that the Haudenosaunee would like to be exempt from any tolls that would be charged and if tolls were charged that some of the funds would go to the joint stewardship board. This isn't really any different than the attitudes of the Six Nations community towards 407 as well.

In terms of the Medicine Plants Agreement obviously from a cultural perspective this is important in the Six Nations community and this protects the rights of the Haudenosaunee to continue to gather as well as provides for a strategy that ensures that the plants that are there now will continue to exist and others can be incorporated into the Valley as well.

In terms of the Economic Opportunities Agreement , it focuses on three areas of work - the first deals with the issue of contract growing, the second with creek realignment, and the third is the cultural features. In terms of this agreement, these points were raised in the February meeting we had of the Expressway Implementation Committee and there is a specific recommendation which we hope addresses some of the issues that were raised at that time which I'll get to in a moment here.

In terms of the Human Heritage Agreement it addresses the need for a Heritage Complex to be developed in close proximity to the Valley, one that would address two themes: cultural but also environmental considerations. Funding for that obviously is not part of the budget that we're moving forward with for Red Hill. But there are some specific clauses in that agreement that speak to the need for us to work with others to see if there isn't an opportunity to acquire the necessary funds. If you look at the Open Space Replacement Strategy there is a specific interest in having an educational centre built as part of that effort and this may very well be a logical way in which to address some cultural interests as well.

In terms of the recommendations, there are four.
The first one : that Council approve these agreements;
the second : that the Mayor and Clerk sign these agreements subject to an implementation plan being developed over the next several weeks; and
the third : that the Public Works Committee review and endorse all potential contracts that are spelled out in the Economic Opportunities Agreement .

And that's my presentation.

Dave Braden: Thankyou Mr. Chairman. There are really some things in here that are really quite good but I'll concentrate on the others. In the negotiations, the Teka News quoted one of the individuals who worked for the City as saying, 'well if we don't get these things signed, we're just going ahead anyway.' I want to know what importance we would place on that, given that that was the statement made by one of the two individuals representing the City.

Chris Murray: Through you Mr. Chairman, I don't know who would have put it quite that way. Clearly, we've been working with the two groups at Six Nations for some time. In fact, if you look at what has transpired since 2002-2003, it is clear that the implementation of this project was important to this community but so were the needs to address some fundamental issues that the Six Nations community was raising. And so we agreed that we would try and accomplish both objectives. And what you have here is our efforts over the last year or so to try and address some fundamental issues. So, I don't think there was a statement made by Guy or myself that follows quite the way I think it was portrayed in the paper. But the understanding clearly with the parties we've been negotiating with is that we're going to try and address both objectives.

Dave Braden: In terms of the chronology of events, can you tell me when Madame Silverberg was working for either us or the lawyer. When was that - was that 2002?

Chris Murray: That's correct.

Dave Braden: Before August?

Chris Murray: Um, yes, before August and after - I'm pretty sure.

Dave Braden: With regard to the board that is going to be set up - 3 and 3? Which I think is different that the Red Hill Centre - I think it's a stewardship board. Can I suggest that if it is a political board dealing government to government that that makes sense. But if it's a stewardship board, where we have strength is really in the Conservation Authority. The Conservation Authority has already worked on that. So we just need to think about that. Conservation is taking the lead on looking after natural resource management and I don't want to relinquish that - I'm on the board of the Conservation Authority as well. But I think we should decide what is useful. And if it is less political then we should slide that over to the people that have the skills and the dedication. So I'm going to suggest that as something that needs to be thought of. Now - I want to trash the highway, I don't want to trash your report. So I don't want to hold it up. But I'm saying if we're going to go ahead on these things, let's do the best we can with the people that have the commitment and let's make this as a-political as possible.

If we want to talk about the Red Hill Centre - I'm not sure what that is - but my understanding is that there is no commitment of any monies but rather we just want to see it happen. Is that as far she goes? There's no commitment of money?

Chris Murray: That's correct.

Dave Braden: Again as a comment, I'd like to point out that the Conservation Authority has plans to do an Interpretive Centre and it seems to me that we have some obvious fits here that we should not be pursuing for all of the right reasons.

Let me ask you this, and there are some real good political points here, but in terms of sole-sourcing and getting some good genetic material to reforest either the Valley or parts broader than the Valley - how is the government going to deal with sole-sourcing when probably the biggest nurseries in the Province are sitting in Margaret's and my wards?

And they're not going to get access to this. That's pretty sensitive in this municipality.

Chris Murray: I don't think that that is the case, but, I thought there was some purchasing that would be from external service providers, is that not correct?

Dave Braden: This is sole-sourcing of nursery material. I think I'm right Mr. Chair and by all means interrupt me if I'm not but I think you're trying to say we're going to get our native material from Native entrepreneurs at Six Nations.

Chris Murray: I think Paul Williams in February said it best - it's an opportunity, there are no guarantees here at all. When you look at the nature of the materials that we're talking about it is trees, grass, shrubs, acquatics. The needs are broad and with that comes varying degrees of complexity in terms of producing that material. So, in my mind we need - it will be difficult to imagine that there won't be an opportunity for the private sector given the range of material that we need.

But the first step is to see if there is the capacity at Six Nations to undertake some of this work. There are no guarantees at this point in time that there is. I mean obviously we're approaching this from a partnership standpoint which means that Brian Shynold's group will be very interested in wanting to participate in this. We're trying to work out an equitable arrangement between ourselves and Six Nations to give them a chance to seize an opportunity to create some long term potential for themselves that will extend just beyond Red Hill.

But at this point there is, they themselves and I think Paul Williams, said this is just an opportunity, there is no absolute guarantees.

Dave Braden: One last question, in the slide under history August 2002, meeting with both elected and Confederacy Councils - can you tell me if you were meeting with Councillors or Chiefs - or were you meeting with people that were representatives of the Confederacy Chiefs?

Chris Murray: Norman Jacobs was at that meeting. I believe Arnie General was at that meeting. Uh, Chief Roberta Jamieson was at that meeting. Uh. I'm trying to think of who else was there. From our side the City Manager, the Mayor, Peter Crockett. David General with the elected Council was there also.

Those were the participants. So, if I had to characterize the Confederacy's involvement in that meeting it would be representatives.

Dave Braden: Just a final comment, and I've made a real attempt to go down there and talk to the Confederacy Council. That requires a whole lot of commitment. And I wanted to know if you had met them. I understand from your answer that you had a Confederacy Chief and representatives, or what you thought were representatives, of the Confederacy Council. Thanks for that clarification.

Dave Mitchell: Thank you Mr. Chair. I just want to thank Chris and staff for all the work they've done to date. The one slide you didn't put up there was on the back page. It shows "Red Hill Valley Project: More Than a Road." And it is. An awful lot more.

It's part of the drainage scenario for storm drainage that we were dealing with this morning and are going to continue to deal with. It's part of the sanitary sewer project for the whole City. There's a whole lot of components to this - the replanting of the trees, the soil degradation of water washing down the Creek.

The fact that local residents and everybody involved have cleaned it up. It's absolutely beautiful through there now. All the fridges and the tires and junk that was there 5 or 8 years ago is gone now.

So when it says, 'More than a road,' it is. And I just want to thank Chris and his staff for - they've got a lot more patience than I would ever have. They're doing an incredible job.

Moved/Seconded. Carried.