Latest news with #CouncilofYukonFirstNations
Hamilton Spectator
4 days ago
- Politics
- Hamilton Spectator
AFN Yukon and CYFN chief positions set to be consolidated this year
According to a statement from the Council of Yukon First Nations, effective Oct. 1, 2025 the positions of Grand Chief and AFN Yukon Regional Chief will be merged into one. The consolidation comes out of resolutions made by Yukon First Nation chiefs at the Assembly of First Nations Yukon Chiefs Summit on May 21 and 22, as well as a May 30 Council of Yukon First Nations Leadership meeting. 'The new model is intended to streamline governance, reduce duplication, and strengthen national and political advocacy grounded in the shared priority of all 14 Yukon First Nations,' reads the statement. The consolidation was being discussed since spring 2024, reads the statement. Chiefs arrived at the consensus to consolidate the two positions into a 'unified Grand Chief model' after a substantive review process and much discussion, per the statement. CYFN Grand Chief Peter Johnston is quoted as saying that the decision will help unify efforts and advance the interests of all Yukon First Nations. AFN Yukon Regional Chief Kluane Adamek is quoted in the release as saying that the new model will allow for stronger advocacy. It will ensure 'that Yukon First Nations are not only heard, but are leading the conversation both regionally and nationally,' per Adamek. Elections for the new Council of Yukon First Nations Grand Chief will be held on June 25 at the CYFN general assembly meeting in Teslin. Five candidates are currently in the running for the position: former Kluane First Nation Chief Math'ieya Alatini, current Vuntut Gwitchin Chief Pauline Frost, former Carcross Tagish First Nation councillor Rose Sellars, former CYFN Grand Chief Ed Schultz and former Champagne and Aishihik First Nations Chief Steve Smith. Whoever ends up winning the election will assume the duties and responsibilities formerly held by the AFN Regional Chief, per the statement. The new grand chief will also be responsible for a 'regional mandate review to assess how Yukon First Nations are currently supported,' reads the statement. The CYFN constitution will have to be amended, and the proposed changes to the constitution will be presented at the CYFN general assembly, ensuring all 14 Yukon First Nations will have voting rights. Financial resources, authority and responsibilities associated with the AFN Yukon Regional Chief will also be transferred to the CYFN. Error! Sorry, there was an error processing your request. There was a problem with the recaptcha. Please try again. You may unsubscribe at any time. By signing up, you agree to our terms of use and privacy policy . This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google privacy policy and terms of service apply. Want more of the latest from us? Sign up for more at our newsletter page .
CBC
03-05-2025
- Politics
- CBC
Should the Yukon River be considered a 'person' with rights? Some say it's an idea whose time has come
Social Sharing Intrinsic to the Yukon River are skills shared and carefully honed among families, for generations. Nika Silverfox-Young, a citizen of the Little Salmon Carmacks First Nation in the Yukon, calls this blood memory. "We really travelled a lot and we used the rivers as our highways. We really needed them," she said. "We'd pick out the best parts, and listen to the land when the salmon were coming back. "We've lost that ability to listen to what our land is telling us. She is screaming right now about how we need to protect her." Silverfox-Young said the river is "part of me." "I feel like I'm legally, genetically obligated to protect this land ... I want that to continue." Silverfox-Young is among a growing number of people who think it's time the Yukon River had more significant environmental protections — in part, by granting the waterway legal personhood. It's an idea that already has the support of the Council of Yukon First Nations, and Alaska Native people, whose cultures are also intertwined with the river. In the face of climate change, industrial impacts and imperilled salmon populations, advocates are now calling for dialogue and cooperation, among communities along the river and all levels of government. Efforts often stem from 'long-standing disputes' There's precedent in Canada for granting environmental personhood. The Innu of Ekuanitshit and a regional municipality in Quebec granted the Magpie River with the status in 2021, to primarily defend it against hydro development. A resolution grants the river nine rights, including the right to flow, the right to maintain its biodiversity and the right to be safe from pollution. It even has the right to sue. Calls for environmental personhood are mounting in B.C., too. In October, the British Columbia Assembly of First Nations passed a resolution calling on the province and others to work with First Nations to advance the legal personhood of nature, "including water bodies such as rivers and lakes, forests and mountains within a First Nations' unceded traditional territory." And in New Zealand, after more than a century-long fight led by Māori to protect the Whanganui River, the country's parliament passed legislation in 2017 that granted the waterway fundamental rights that build in Indigenous cosmologies — the first of its kind in the world. There's a common dominator to every effort to assign legal personhood to entities found in the natural world, said Stepan Wood, professor at Allard School of Law and the director of the Centre for Law and the Environment at the University of British Columbia. "They arise out of longstanding disputes or claims of treaty violations," he said, noting the case of the Whanganui River. "From the beginning, one of the core demands of the Māori was 'land back,' which is again a similar, you know, refrain," he said, referring to the Indigenous-led movement to reclaim Indigenous jurisdiction. Trouble was, Wood said, the New Zealand parliament was dead-set against allowing Māori ownership of the land. So, a compromise was struck. The idea was to legally define those connections, steeped in Māori law and cosmology — nature as a group of ancestors. Legal personhood hinges on local contexts, and it needs to be customized accordingly, Wood said. "There's no one-size-fit-all approach," he said. "One of the similarities with Canada is that you have 150 years of systematic violation of treaty promises by the British Crown and, you know, dispossession of Indigenous peoples and total negation of their laws and their jurisdiction and their sovereignty." As for how this could be applied in the Yukon, Wood said that's likely to be an open question for some time. "Would the goal be to have laws adopted by the self-governing nations, so within either they're delegated or they're inherent self governance authority? Would it be territorial legislation or federal legislation?" Wood also said it could take the form of a transboundary Indigenous treaty. "Kind of like a treaty amongst the various First Nations up and down the Yukon River saying we are all in agreement that the Yukon River is a, you know, a living entity, with spirit." 'The water, to us, is life' In March, a majority of member nations belonging to the Council of Yukon First Nations (CYFN) voted in favour of looking into legal personhood for the Yukon River. Made up of two parts, the resolution also calls on the territory to support both short- and long-term management plans of the river's corridor, which includes banks and channels — land integral to the waterway. Linked to that, the missive urges the territory to consider legal personhood "for the entirety of the Yukon River Corridor with all affected First Nations." Erin McQuaig, the deputy chief of the Tr'ondëk Hwëch'in First Nation in Dawson City, Yukon, said legal personhood would elevate needed protections for the river. "The water, to us, is life. It gives life to every living form on earth and it should be recognized as such," McQuaig said. McQuaig said this work corresponds with efforts to save chinook salmon, whose numbers in the Yukon River have declined precipitously for years and have been plunged into a deep crisis. "It's imperative for us as people to continue and also reclaim our culture. We have many, many young citizens that have never seen a salmon come out of the river where we live." Premier Ranj Pillai addressed CYFN's resolution last week in the legislative assembly. He said he knows it's important to protect the river, but that his government hasn't contemplated environmental personhood. "To be very open, I don't have enough of a breadth of understanding of just what this would mean from a policy perspective and legally, but I know that we'll continue to work with Tr'ondëk Hwëch'in … and we'll be speaking with the Council of Yukon First Nations on the resolution," Pillai said. Whitehorse dam relicensing sparks talk Pillai said conversations about legal personhood in the territory have stemmed from work on a regional land use plan in the Dawson area. Buried in the recommended plan released in 2022, the planning commission also floats legal personhood. But the concept has been raised in the territory's south for years. The Yukon's largest hydroelectric dam, in Whitehorse, has been moving through the relicensing process. While the facility provides crucial electricity — meeting about 75 per cent of the territory's demand in the summer alone — it's come under intense scrutiny at times for its impacts on Yukon River salmon. This is the first time the dam has been reviewed by the Yukon Environmental and Socio-economic Assessment Board (YESAB). During the assessment phase, the Ta'an Kwäch'än Council raised the prospect of granting legal personhood to the Yukon River. "To date, there has not been consideration given to the Yukon River as a natural person, complete with rights, nor has there been gratitude expressed for the electricity it has given to us," the First Nation states in a 2023 submission to YESAB. While the board ultimately did not address the idea of environmental personhood in its assessment of the dam, a spokesperson told CBC News that, "YESAB's process enables future dialogue on this emerging topic within Yukon." Catherine Ford-Lammers, the lead on the Whitehorse dam relicensing for the Carcross/Tagish First Nation, said her community is also interested in environmental personhood and looking at what's worked elsewhere. "It does need to be looked at, but then I guess it could come with its own set of complications in terms of who are the parties to manage that personhood for the Yukon River," Ford-Lammers said. Nicole Tom, former chief of the Little Salmon Carmacks First Nation, now serves as a mentor and advisor for Yukon-based To Swim and Speak with Salmon, an Indigenous-led conservation organization that empowers youth. No doubt, she said, the process would be complex, with no shortage of legal wrangling and politics. But Tom said it's necessary to wade into that world — threats to freshwater are too great to ignore anymore. Case in point, she said, the Eagle Mine failure that sent shockwaves across the territory and continues to roil people who live in the region. "Those conversations are not far-fetched, and when you have political alignment that's when you can really see some changes for the good," Tom said. "It's necessary with climate change, it's necessary with everything that's going on right now that these special water systems be protected. "It's a means of survival and it's a means of cultural identity." A transboundary river coalition There are dozens of communities along the Yukon, the third-longest river in North America. Like those communities, the river is also diverse — the waterway braids, riffles and plumbs to great depths near Lake Laberge. Mackenzie Englishoe, youth advisor for Alaska's Tanana Chiefs Conference, a tribal consortium of 42 villages in the state's interior, wants a transboundary coalition formed within five years to help unify communities. Englishoe, who's Gwichya Gwich'in, believes this would further galvanize people to speak up and act. "I think that would include lobbying, educating ourselves — our people — and outside communities about our relationship to the river, and respect for the river. I think this would establish key protections and help our salmon. It would help all animals and the people along the river," Englishoe said. "My identity as a person is, I have to look at this river as something that's taken care of me, and has sacrificed for me, and I have to do the same for her." Jared Gonet, director of To Swim and Speak with Salmon, said the first step is decolonization. He said the idea isn't to consider rivers as people, so much as living entities that hold entire ecosystems together — communities, too. "I've heard Kaska Elders speak about, like, mountains, rivers, headwaters as beings having their own agency," Gonet said. "For me, the biggest challenge is going to be just talking, getting the time, the resources, the people, those bright minds to come back and start, you know, really pushing and talking and engaging people." Wood, the law professor, said environmental personhood can shift paradigms, changing for the better people's relationship to the natural world. "So, changing it from nature being a collection of objects to be owned and exploited by humans, through nature as a community of older, more senior relatives to be revered and respected by humans," he said.
CBC
03-04-2025
- General
- CBC
Council of Yukon First Nations cancels some family support programs due to lack of Jordan's Principle funding
The Council of Yukon First Nations has shut down programs that provided food, children's clothing, short-term housing and other support for families due to a lack of Jordan's Principle funding. The situation has left at least one mother scrambling to figure out how she'll make ends meet. More than 450 families received letters from the council (CYFN) last month stating that Indigenous Services Canada (ISC) had not confirmed if it would give the council Jordan's Principle funding for the 2025-2026 fiscal year. "Due to this uncertainty, we cannot guarantee … supports beyond March 31, 2025," the letter states. Jordan's Principle, established in 2016, is meant to ensure First Nations children have access to government-funded services when they need them, without jurisdictional disputes getting in the way. Funding is application-based. CYFN executive director Shadelle Chambers said that ISC usually responds to the council's applications in December or January to confirm how much money it will get for the coming fiscal year. However, this year, the federal government only confirmed on March 22 that Jordan's Principle funding would continue into 2025-2026 but still isn't accepting applications. With funding from last fiscal year used up, Chambers said CYFN doesn't have money to sustain services like its "necessities of life" program, which provided families with vouchers for things like groceries, children's clothing and baby products, as well as programs for short-term housing and respite care. "Having to send letters to our families that we work with that we're no longer able to support them in certain areas has been extremely frustrating," Chambers said. "[It's] just another one of the systemic issues that First Nations and Yukon First Nations families and children have to face in terms of, you know, the practices of the federal government." 'I still feel hopeless,' mother says of losing supports Ashley Russell, a single mother of two and Trʼondëk Hwëchʼin citizen, was among the hundreds of people who used the "necessities of life program" and said she went into "sheer panic" when she learned it was ending. "I still feel hopeless," she said. Russell, who's studying to become a social worker, said she used the program for grocery vouchers — $125 every two weeks for each child — and also had a respite worker helping with her younger child, who's neurodivergent. She said she hasn't figured out how to manage everything with those supports gone and is on the verge of quitting school. "Unfortunately, my family is one of the families that suffers with a lot of trauma and I am the only sober person in my entire family, the only person with a driver's license, the only person with a proper education and job," she said. "I'm also a full-time student and trying to work, trying to stay sober, trying to hold my family together… And then to find out that I'm not going to get help, not even paid help — it feels very alone." Chambers said CYFN has been working to connect families with community food programs or other rent assistance options while advocating for clarity and action from ISC. "The reality is this [situation] has caused a lot of stress for families and children, and it has also caused a lot of stress for our staff and our team," she said. "And, you know, we're here to help support families and when one of our main access to supports is cut off for no realistic reason … it's frustrating, right?" ISC changing how applications are processed In response to a request for comment about the status of Jordan's Principle funding in the Yukon, ISC spokesperson Eric Head largely repeated portions of an "operational bulletin" the department issued in February outlining changes to how it was processing applications. Changes include requiring more documentation for applications and narrowing the items and services that funding would be approved for. "ISC is reviewing Jordan's Principle processes and policies at regional and national levels with long-term sustainability in mind," Head wrote, quoting the bulletin. "There is continued funding for 2025-2026 for Jordan's Principle. In addition, ISC is working to communicate with requestors." Chambers, however, accused the government of "deflecting" from the "real issues" — including the fact that it has a backlog of 135,000 Jordan's Principle applications to get through — and said the consequences "trickling down" to the families who were using CYFN's programs. Russell, meanwhile, said she'd spoken to other families in the same situation as hers and that while people understand the problem on the federal level, it doesn't make things easier. "That doesn't take away our pain, that doesn't take away our frustration and just feeling alienated on our own land. Like, it's just very exhausting," she said. While Russell said she thought families needed to show grace to CYFN support workers dealing with the fallout, workers also needed to show "empathy and compassion" for families now suddenly struggling with what to do next. "It's not the workers' fault, but also like, the clients can't be expected to behave properly — they're in survival mode or in panic survival mode, you know?" she said.
CBC
15-03-2025
- General
- CBC
Almost 2,000 Yukoners eligible for claims under Canada's First Nations child welfare system suit
First Nations families can claim money for being discriminated and broken apart under Canada's First Nations child welfare system between 1991 and 2022. As Virginie Ann tells us, the Council of Yukon First Nations is expecting to see almost 2,000 eligible applicants.
CBC
12-03-2025
- Health
- CBC
Yukon health minister expresses confidence in shelter operator amid calls to end its gov't contract
The Yukon's minister of health and social services expressed her continued trust in the Connective Support Society on Tuesday, amid calls for the territorial government to end its contract with the organization. Connective has been running the Whitehorse emergency shelter at 405 Alexander St., along with the housing units above it, in partnership with the Council of Yukon First Nations since 2022. Its contract was set to expire at the end of the month. However, the Yukon government has extended the deal to the end of June. Last April, a coroners' inquest examined the deaths of four women at the shelter. There have been a number of deaths at the shelter since. These deaths have prompted loved ones and the First Nation of Na-Cho Nyäk Dun to demand that Connective be fired. "Any deaths or serious incidents where people are injured is not acceptable," Tracy-Anne McPhee, the health minister, told reporters after Question Period on Tuesday. "But Connective are experts in their field. They are. And they deserve our confidence as well," she said. "What they do is commit to this community.… They've committed to bringing their expertise and to assisting the individuals at the shelter." McPhee said the non-profit organization has also committed to improvement and that extending its contract was to ensure stability. "The risk of changing a vendor at this time, or an operator for 405 Alexander is a risk to real people," she said, adding that Connective could "likely" still be running the shelter in three months. The minister said the short-term extension includes stronger oversight, operational improvements and enhanced accountability measures to improve safety. The issue of oversight was what the NDP's Annie Blake wanted to better understand. "What does that mean for the government or who's going to be responsible for having that extra oversight with Connective running the shelter for an additional three months?" asked Blake, who represents the Vuntut-Gwitchin riding. McPhee said as part of its transfer payment agreement with Connective, the Yukon Government is required to monitor and ensure its goals for the shelter are met. In mid-April, the government is set to host a summit with Yukon First Nations governments. That summit will be for developing a long-term sheltering strategy, including how to improve the programs and services at 405 Alexander. That summit could also include discussions about the facility's approach to harm reduction, specifically the level of accommodation for alcohol and substance use. Currently, the shelter operates on a "low-barrier" model, which Yukon Party Leader Currie Dixon said needs to change. The party has repeatedly blamed the shelter's "permissive" policy on intoxicants as a key contributor to problems like crime and public nuisances. Dixon called for changing to a "higher-barrier" model, though specifics would need to be ironed out with stakeholders. "The way that the shelter is working right now is not serving the best needs of Yukoners. It's not serving the needs of those who are clients of the facility," Dixon said.
