Creating an Indigenous advisory committee is an important step for the community, according to Timmins Mayor Steve Black.
At its March 27 meeting, council approved the creation of the committee, along with hosting training for cultural sensitivity and awareness as well as for truth and reconciliation, creating a leadership forum with municipal and Indigenous leaders to meet regularly, and to permanently raise three flags at city hall. The three flags are the Mattagami First Nation, which is the traditional territory of the city, the Nishnawbe Aski Nation, which is the greater treaty land, and the Metis Nation of Ontario.
To cover the cost of the training and flagpoles, and to support National Aboriginal Day events, $50,000 from the 2017 surplus has been allocated.
Black said Goldcorp has reached out as well to indicate its support and the company has agreed to match the city’s $50,000 contribution. The “seed money” will help pay for items that the committee may recommend and that have a cost associated with them.
For example, he said there have already been discussions that the signs recently unveiled for downtown Timmins don’t have Cree or Ojibway text.
While council is supporting the creation of the advisory committee, Black said talks with staff, Indigenous leaders and stakeholders will decide how to implement it. Before the application process is opened, the structure needs to be approved by council.
He said the committee is an “important step” for the community.
“We want to do it in partnership with our Indigenous communities and our Indigenous representatives here in the City of Timmins and make sure we form a committee that will be most beneficial to the process going forward and ensure we’re having the discussions that are relevant to moving things forward," he said.
Seeing change is the goal of the committee.
“Definitely in my discussions with the Indigenous leadership across the north they don’t want to have discussions, they want to see actions being taken to improve relationships and access to services in the community and those partnerships,” said Black. “A good focus of this committee will be getting the right people in place to identify some key actions that the City of Timmins can move forward with to make significant steps in the right direction.”
Several council members declared their support for the initiative.
“I am proud to be able to support this resolution. I think it speaks volumes for where we’re at and certainly where we need to go,” said Coun. Andrew Marks.
When it came time to vote, everyone except Coun. Rick Dubeau voted in favour of the resolution.
“We stated many times here we would not bring something forward at one meeting and pass it the same night, I think there’s too much information here. I would like to be better educated on every aspect of all this cause there’s so much here that we are committing ourselves to going forward,” he said.
You can read the full resolution brought to council here.
