The City of St. Albert has completed some reconciliation initiatives, but others will always be ongoing, says the city co-ordinator dedicated to their implementation.
In the three years since the Payhonin truth and reconciliation report was established through community consultation, the city has completed five of the 14 recommendations, while four are incomplete, and five focus on ongoing efforts that do not have a set endpoint.
Dana Giddings, the city’s Indigenous relations co-ordinator, officially stepped into her new role at the start of February 2022 after council funded the full-time position as part of budget deliberation.
When looking at report recommendations, Giddings said it’s key to keep in mind that many do not have a “defined mark of completion.”
“It’s important to recognize — especially in terms of reconciliation as a whole — there’s really no end date, no start and finish,” Giddings said. “For many of these things, I don’t think we’ll ever put a big stamp of ‘We’re complete.’”
One recommendation that can be checked off, however, is the creation of Giddings's role, which was recommendation 5: a full-time equivalent position to work on reconciliation initiatives and maintain relationships with Indigenous organizations and peoples.
Since stepping into her role, Giddings — who formerly worked as an environmental technician in the city’s utilities and environment department — said she has been focused on building relationships and trust with Indigenous community members and groups, including residents and organizations in St. Albert, and surrounding nations.
“We really need to ensure we have those trusting relationships on an ongoing basis that really help us collectively move forward and make progress,” Giddings said.
Giddings was drawn to the role of Indigenous relations co-ordinator because of her education at the University of Alberta’s Faculty of Native Studies, and previous experience working with Indigenous communities through consultation work.
This work is also personally meaningful, Giddings said, due to her family roots. Giddings said her Métis heritage stems from her maternal grandfather.
“It’s hard for me because that side of my family, I do not have any living relatives,” Giddings said. “I wasn’t raised knowing what it meant to be Métis … and trying to find that and really figure out who I am is something that is a challenge, and I think that’s common,” Giddings said.
One of the Payhonin recommendations is for the city to report annually on reconciliation efforts, including progress made toward improving relationships with Indigenous peoples (recommendation 11).
Giddings said now that her position has been filled, the first annual report will cover 2022 once the year is complete.
This report will work to address recommendation 12, to recognize and celebrate success and learnings as achieved by the city as well as individual staff and community members who contribute to reconciliation, Giddings said.
In addition to the hiring of an Indigenous relations co-ordinator, three other tangible recommendations have also been completed.
These include making the use of land acknowledgements at city gatherings, events, and on print material and throughout municipal spaces, standard (recommendation 4).
The city has also installed two additional flag poles to have Métis and Treaty 6 flags permanently flying (recommendation 13). St. Albert has also amended its flag policy to have the Treaty 6 and Métis flags hang next to the Canadian flag in recognition that Indigenous nations are sovereign entities (recommendation 10).
On Sept. 12, 2021, around 80 people gathered at St. Albert Place to see the raising of the Confederacy of Treaty Six First Nations and the Métis Nation of Alberta flags. The flags were installed on two new flagpoles, and will remain there permanently.
Further, the city includes Indigenous awareness workshops as part of new council orientation, and staff and councillors have access to Indigenous awareness training, Giddings said (recommendations 7 and 8).
An example she gave of the training is the city’s onboarding program, which now uses a video describing respectful relations with Indigenous peoples.
“That way, it gives a bit of the history of St. Albert, and why these aspects are important,” Giddings said.
Advisory committee to implement recommendations
Some report recommendations, such as developing a reconciliation plan for St. Albert, will be work for a future Indigenous advisory committee (whose creation is recommendation 2).
The bylaw outlining how the committee will operate once created was set to return to council on Oct. 11, but on Tuesday, Sept. 27, Mayor Cathy Heron said via email that administration will be seeking a time extension on the bylaw. The new date has not yet been announced.
Heron said if the request is approved, "administration will use the extra time to ensure we have the right path forward regarding this important work."
The report recommends council establish sustainable funding for the committee (recommendation 3). The most recent presentation to council on the committee details the annual budget would be $7,500, though the budget will be finalized when council approves the bylaw.
Once it’s created, the committee will develop a reconciliation plan for St. Albert (recommendation 1).
Ongoing work
Giddings said the city is working to utilize an Indigenous-relations lens in its daily operations in an effort to fulfill recommendation 9, which requires the city dialogue with Indigenous communities prior to commencing broader engagement for projects, in order to follow proper and respectful protocols.
Other ongoing work involves considering indoor and outdoor permanent spaces for the delivery of Indigenous cultural programming, and for Indigenous organizations and their administrations to be housed (recommendation 14).
Giddings said there have been no formal decisions on this recommendation.
“It’s definitely something we’re continually talking about, and trying to consider,” Giddings said.
Giddings said the city is working to build relationships with Indigenous organizations through leadership-to-leadership, nation-to-nation, meetings (recommendation 6).
Michif Cultural Connections knowledge keeper Sharon Morin said the city still has a ways to go in building relationships with Indigenous community members, something she argued was demonstrated in the inclusion of the bench donated by Fortis Alberta for the city’s healing garden.
Morin told The Gazette in August the decision was made without consulting the broader St. Albert Métis community.
She said she is “interested” to see how the city continues to handle its nation-to-nation relationship building, and for Giddings’s annual report.
Morin noted the city may face a reckoning in the future as further ground-truthing, with the possibility of finding unmarked graves, is conducted in St. Albert.
For this reason, she said it’s especially important for the city to be equipped with knowledge and strong relationships going forward.
“The more the city knows, and the more councillors are made aware, and the more actual history they know … the better they will be equipped to work with their citizens in this,” Morin said.
Though Morin said she is still waiting for action from the city on many fronts, she noted taking time and acting with intention is also key, and that’s it “OK” that things take time.
“You don’t want everything to happen right away,” Morin said. “People need to be open to doing the work.”
