[Updated Oct. 18, 2022]

There is a forest meadow on my family’s lease land that changes constantly through the growing season. It’s one of my favourite places. After the spring rains, lush green grass soon overtakes last year’s dead vegetation, and the poplars leaf out. Later, it’s a riot of wildflowers. As the summer wears on, the grasses head out, seedheads dusted pink. Trail cams have caught wildlife including bears, elk and plenty of deer. There’s a bear den on the south side of a hill overlooking the meadow, and a nearby dugout supports waterfowl. You never know what you might see.

So when Autumn Baptiste says that it’s a different experience every time she goes out on the land, I think I understand what she means.

“I don’t know how to explain it. When you’re out on the land, it feels like you’re taking a breath.”

Autumn hunts and gathers medicine on the community land belonging to Thunderchild and Red Pheasant First Nations. When I ask her how she’d respond to landholders who want to control access to their land to prevent damage and keep their livestock and families safe, she says she wants them to feel safe, too.

“I understand where they’re coming from.”

But when it comes to the new trespassing legislation, she feels the provincial government should have consulted more with Indigenous people. She thinks it creates a barrier for those trying to build relationships between Indigenous people and landholders “because it implies that people who are going out onto the land to use the land have very different intentions than what they do.”

The possibility of a court challenge to the new legislation is smouldering, with the Federation of Sovereign Indigenous Nations (FSIN) and Treaty Commissioner of Saskatchewan indicating they are lining up their legal ducks.

The trespassing legislation is just the latest government action that FSIN and the Treaty Commissioner see as violating treaty rights. Another is the sale of Crown lands, which has shrunk the land base on which Indigenous people can exercise their treaty rights.

While Indigenous land users still have access to some Crown land, it’s possible the new legislation could curtail that, too. For example, as FSIN Chief Bobby Cameron told the Star Phoenix this winter, some Crown land may only be accessible through private land.

Jim Range, for one, isn’t betting the new legislation will survive a court challenge. The courts have ruled in favour of honouring treaties in the past, he says, and he expects them to do so again in this case.

Autumn believes the new legislation “will give people that feeling that they can take (the law) into their own hands,” something she sees as very dangerous. It’s worth asking, given how busy rural RCMP forces already are, who is expected to enforce this legislation? Confronting trespassers, or suspected trespassers, is already a regular activity for many civilians in my area, and perhaps we don’t need more encouragement.

Personally, I don’t know what’s going to happen next. I’ve covered few topics in my career that felt so close to home or left me feeling as conflicted as trespassing and this new legislation. I was initially hesitant to even take on this story, but in the end, I couldn’t resist the siren call of such a messy topic.

When I began working on this story, I was almost fully behind the legislation, although I wasn’t sure how enforceable it would be. After talking to everyone (particularly Autumn) and doing more research, I can see more to the issue. I still want the new legislation to work, but I don’t want it to worsen the already-tense relations between farming and Indigenous communities, or encourage more conflict between frustrated landholders and others. This may be a case of wanting to eat my cake and have it, too.

Sharing the land

A big question this province (and much of the country faces) is how to build back relationships between Indigenous communities and their neighbours. Where do you go after you’ve acknowledged the historical injustices that linger today? Much of the solution, in rural areas at least, is going to centre on land access. But how do you ensure land access for Metis and First Nations people in a practical way that also ensures the safety of everyone on the land, especially when we’re talking about hunting or potentially cranky livestock?

Autumn is involved with a group that aims to do just that. The Treaty Land Sharing Network comprises Saskatchewan landholders — including farmers and ranchers — who are offering land access to Indigenous and Metis people to exercise their treaty rights.

The people in the network are “showing that the treaty relationships aren’t severed. They can be reconnected,” says Autumn.

Landholders who join the Treaty Land Sharing Network agree to allow land users to exercise the full range of their treaty and inherent rights, unless it’s unsafe to do so due to other land uses (for example, hunting on a small land parcel). Landholders and land users also agree to the same protocols such as foot access only.

Landholders can list any characteristics that might be of interest, such as sweat rocks, wildlife or plant species considered medicine. The Treaty Land Sharing Network then posts this information to its website. Through the network, land users get the landholder’s contact information, so they can get a heads up about any other issues and learn more about the land, Autumn adds. Landholders can also post signs stating they are part of the network.*

Autumn says they’re still making connections, but the response has been great so far. The network has also been a way to have conversations about the treaties, she says, and the intentions of the signatories, which was to share the land, she says.

Is this the solution to all the issues around land access and trespassing, or even around reconciliation? No — but, again, I don’t think there is a single solution. I don’t know how many landholders will sign up for the network, but what makes me hopeful is that it acknowledges the public good and relies on building good will. A person might argue that’s also what makes it fragile, but I think that building and maintaining good will is one of the few things that works in the long run. More on that next week.

Read the final chapter here:

• No trespass: The public good

*Update: This story originally stated that landholders joining the Treaty Land Sharing Network could specify “any restrictions” on land access, which is incorrect. The story has been clarified accordingly. We regret the error.

The post No trespass: Rebuilding treaty relationships appeared first on Canadian Cattlemen.

Amy Seesequasis says for Indigenous people, everything revolves around the land.

“When we look at our culture, it’s based on the land,” Seesequasis says in a virtual discussion on September 15, moderated by Canadian Cattlemen editor Lisa Guenther for a webinar with the Canadian Farm Writers’ Federation. “All our teachings, our language. And so, for Indigenous people, land is everything.”

In that regard, Seequasis says, ranchers and Indigenous peoples have the land in common — both depend on it for their livelihood.

“For Indigenous peoples, living off the land was always about survival, we needed to live,” she says. “And for settler families who came here to farm and to ranch, they too came here and they started that for survival.”

Seesequasis is a treaty relationship consultant and also works for Sask. Polytechnic. Previously, Seesequasis worked for the Office of the Treaty Commissioner. This job provided her with a variety of opportunities, including working with the Treaty Land Sharing Network.

The Treaty Land Sharing Network is a group of farmers, ranchers and other landholders who offer land access to Indigenous people to practice their treaty rights, ranging from hunting to gathering medicine. Landholders include their contact information and approximate land location through the network’s website, as well as relevant information about the land parcel such as plants or wildlife. Landholders who join the network agree to allow land users to exercise the full range of their treaty and inherent rights, unless there’s a safety issue related to other land uses.*

Tension between Indigenous and producer communities have grown in recent years with the killing of Colten Boushie, a young Indigenous man, by Biggar-area farmer Gerald Stanley, and left many Indigenous people feeling they can’t safely access privately owned land. The Treaty Land Sharing Network ensures Indigenous peoples can access the land safely and securely and tries to repair the relationship between producers and Indigenous peoples.

The network has been in the works since 2018 and officially launched in the summer of 2020. Seesequasis says the two founders of the network — Valerie Zink, a settler with a family history of farming, and Philip Brass, an Indigenous artist, hunter, and land-based educator — saw how conflict over the land affected relationships.

“A conversation began about, ‘How do we tackle this issue?’ about making sure that there is safe space for Indigenous treaty partners to access the land, and that settlers who hold title to land, what can they do to make those spaces safer,” Seesequasis says. 

“The biggest thing was education. Providing awareness and opportunities for those partners to reconnect in spaces where historically they haven’t been able to, but they were meant to be in those spaces together.”

Tom Harrison is a rancher north of Regina, near Southey, Sask, and was also part of the Canadian Farm Writers’ Federation event. He had some conversations with his wife and daughter that inspired them to join the Treaty Land Sharing Network.

“My wife and I and our daughter, we were thinking about this long before we heard of the (Treaty Land Sharing Network),” Harrison says. “I remember having conversations with my wife about this. We thought, we’ve got to do something.”

Harrison says he’s had a few Indigenous people reach out to him looking to hunt on his land but says it’s important to get the word out so more Indigenous people are aware this resource exists.

“I haven’t been very inundated with a lot of (Indigenous) people on this,” Harrison says. “I don’t know…how many people actually have knowledge about this Treaty Land Sharing Network. I don’t know how well it’s been advertised. You’ve got people there, they might not have access to Wi-Fi…but they want to go out and shoot a deer. So how do you advertise this program to them and make it welcoming to them?”

Seesequasis also says another issue is the new trespassing legislation in Saskatchewan, which came into effect on January 1, 2022, and says that anyone who wants to access rural landowner’s property for anything deemed recreational must have electronic, written, or oral consent. This has been opposed by many with the Treaty Land Sharing Network, although the network does ask people to contact landholders before their initial visit to ensure everyone’s safety.

However, Harrison, who is also involved with the Saskatchewan Stock Growers’ Association, which pushed for the new legislation, says the association was mainly concerned with recreational users trespassing, not Indigenous people practicing treaty rights. Harrison adds, however, that he can’t speak for the intentions of other groups that were lobbying the government for the legislation.

Despite some differences of opinion over the trespassing legislation, Harrison says the Treaty Land Sharing Network is a start towards truth and reconciliation, but more can be done by producers.

“Truth and reconciliation are important,” he says. “But it’s got to be more than just being aware of it. You’ve got to do something about it.”

At the end of her discussion with the Canadian Farm Writers’ Federation, Seesequasis spoke about a moment with the Treaty Land Sharing Network, when they got together with a group of Indigenous peoples to hold a ceremony on a farm involved with the network. She says it was a powerful moment because it was the first time she’s seen a ceremony held off a First Nations community with so many settlers involved.

“There we were, despite the Indian Act, despite residential schools, despite all of those policies made to eliminate the Indigenous treaty partner,” she says. “And there was the Indigenous treaty partner still extending their hand with love and sharing ceremony and giving it back and saying, ‘No, we’re going to still work together and move forward in a good way.’

“Settlers have a story here, as well — that they came here for survival, and Indigenous people need access to the land. And together, despite what took place, we can work together at the grassroots level.”

For more information on the network, visit treatylandsharingnetwork.ca.

*Update: This story originally stated that landholders joining the Treaty Land Sharing Network could specify “any restrictions on activity,” which is incorrect. The mistake does not belong to the reporter, but was made during the editing process. We regret the error.

The post Treaty Land Sharing Network connects producers and Indigenous people through land access appeared first on Canadian Cattlemen.