Participating Communities (PC) Trust - How It Will Work
The 10 St’át’imc (PC) Communities will together create a Trust for the purposes of receiving, investing and administering all of the payments into the Trust. Each Community will appoint a Trustee to govern the Trust who is not a chief or councillor. An Administrative Trustee will also be appointed to assist and oversee the management and distribution of trust funds. The Administrative Trustee will be an expert in trust management. All Trustees will be responsible for acting in the best interest of the beneficiaries (the 10 participating communities). Trust monies can be used for a wide variety of trust purposes.
Nation Funds
Community Funds
For example: The Upper St'át'imc Language, Culture and Education Society (USLCES), wants to expand their programming to include a mentorship program for elders to share their traditional knowledge with youth.
For example: A community holds a community meeting to decide how they want to spend their share of the trust funds. As a community, they decide they want to build a gas station and store to create jobs in the community.
USLCES presents their proposal to the Trustees to access the nation portion of the trust funds.
The community brings the idea to Chief and Council, who then present it to the trustee at the community level.
The Trustee determines that the idea does follow the trust purposes and approves the proposal!
Photos from Our Community Information Sessions
St'รกt'imc Unity: A Small Measure of Justice Vote on April 9th, 2011 Get involved: www.statimchydro.ca 1.877.247.0473 | info@statimchydro.ca
What Weʼve Been Hearing: Feedback from Community Meetings Tʼitʼqʼet
Tsalʼálh
“I would like to see more St’át’imc involved in the decisions relating to St’át’imc territory so that we can ensure the lands are treated respectfully.”
“I fear that I may get cancer and die and that would miss out on seeing my grandchildren...”
“We need to respect the animals and land. Then we can think about ourselves.” “Thank you to you all who stuck it out for the people.” “The future is needed for the kids and adults of the community they all need education to make it in today’s world. Jobs aren’t handed out just like that.”
Cayoose “We have been waiting for this for a long time.” “I also feel excited for my people and the future generations to come.”
Skatin
“It would be nice to see all the chiefs or a few of the other chiefs at the community meetings so that “Thank you all for all people see that they your hard work. supported and Great to see all you fought for this chiefs come agreement.” together as one. To make a stand. “ “I guess it would be costly but all the “I agree with this chiefs worked at this because we need agreement and to be money and support able to acknowledge for OUR their contribution FUTURE!!!!” would be nice.” “If it's gotta happen Xwísten educate & train the band members to “It’s good that our run & maintain the future generations facility in question.” are going to be
Xaxlʼíp “Great way to communicate with the people through these information sessions; hope more come out and raise their concerns before the BIG day of decision comes!“
“The benefits from the Hydro Agreement, will give our children, “I am very glad to be grandchildren a a part of this better future, groundbreaking without the experience. It is struggles that our exciting to see (for ancestors had.” real) the doors of our future opening “Knowledge is to many power, without it opportunities for there is doubt. myself, my children, Agreement will grandchildren, and benefit today and future generations.” the future.”
looked after.” “Thank you for all the hard work to the chiefs of the past/ present and even the future.” “I look forward to the upcoming presentation to learn about St’át’imc Hydro Agreement.” “It will be our right and obligation to take care of self and family.”
Xáxtsa7 “Thank you to the whole committee of the St’át’imc Hydro for your hard work for the St’át’imc People. You will be added to ‘Our History’.”
“Glad things are moving along.” "Facebook was a good idea!” “I liked it! Could hear everything!”
NʼQuátqua “I would very much like to make our young people to be healthy. We need to build on making the community healthy for our youth. If they are not healthy, the future of the community will fall apart.” “I am an elder and living on-reserve in N'Quatqua. There are a lot of things to think about, having attended one meeting. I have lots of reading to do.”
Tsʼkwʼáylaxw “I think that we should spend the majority of the settlement on providing health care for our elders, better education opportunities for our youth to learn their culture and heritage, and housing is a must as I see this as a major issue with a lot of people.” “The trust agreement is important for me to understand.”
Lilʼwat “I would vote yes based on just knowing the process is underway. That the May 10, 1911 declaration is alive and well. This process is one of many in which we as First Nations must take to have the world acknowledge our title and rights.” “If the hydro community helps our people, I’m all for it.” “We need to plan for our future employment wellness, and education.”
Samahquam “We have been waiting for this for a long time” “I also feel excited for my people and the future generations to come.” “I am very glad to be a part of this groundbreaking experience. It is exciting to see (for real) the doors of our future opening to many opportunities for myself, my children, grandchildren, and future generations.”
Special Edition
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Negotiations Timeline
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Early 1900’s: Hydro development began on the territory Mid 1900’s: Due to growing demand, Hydro development intensified. 1. 1989: BC Hydro began studying route selection to add the 500kv line. 2. 1989: BC Hydro approached the 4 communities that would be affected by the proposed line. 3. 1990-1993: Meetings were held to determine how all of the impacts would be addressed. 4. 1991: Inception of current St’át’imc Nation/BCH arrangement. 5. 1993: November 1. The St’át’imc Nation and BCH signed off the Negotiating Protocol. 6. 1993: April, Thalassa Research provided a summary of Hydro (permit) issues to SNH, which became part of the negotiation process. 7. 1993-1996: A database was created in which 1008 issues were identified by the communities. 8. 1995: April 10. St’atimc Nation sent BCH draft list of grievances. 9. 1995: December 1. St’át’imc Nation sent BCH a more detailed list of grievances. 10. Late 1990’s: A socio-economic impact study was commissioned to Westland Resource Group to document the impacts Hydro had on our people, resources and economy.
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2011
11. 1998: Memorandum of Understanding. Due to the number of grievances identified, the issues were separated into 2 tables. 12. 1999: Arcus provided the nation with the “Heritage Resource Inventory Study.” 13. 1999: The Bridge Coastal Fish & Wildlife Restorative Program was established to address impacts of development of BC Hydro's plants. 14. 1999: The St’át’imc Nation Fisheries Cooperative group was established as the result of a court settlement. 15. 2004: The Heritage Management Plan was tabled with BCH as a result of the Heritage working group reviewing the research study done by Arcus. 16. 2005: Both parties needed some indication progress was being made in negotiations and agreed to submit settlement offers to each other. 17. 2005 - 2007: An approach was considered to have BCH agree to pay a settlement amount, thus creating the Quantum. At this time, it was too far apart to reach an agreement. 18. 2007: The Quantum gap was getting smaller so both parties could see the light at the end of the tunnel. 19. 2010: December 17. The Chiefs were finally satisfied with the contents of the agreements and initialed the Ratification Agreement which is now being presented to the people.
All Chiefs fully support the Agreement and are recommending it to their membership “Xaxtsa7 was the least impacted but the agreement has already benefited our community because we’re finally hooked up to the grid. That was one of the key issues supported by all the St’át’imc chiefs was that the southern communities had to get electricity before anything moved forward. This agreement has also helped to bring our membership back together, prior to this, our membership attendance was about a dozen people at the community meetings, but now we have between 200 to 300 people attending our membership meetings.” - Chief Don Harris Xaxtsa7
“This agreement covers almost everything, we’re finally getting something out of the Hydro development that has been here for years. I think that people don’t realize Hydro’s going to be doing the same thing they’ve always done, we still own the land and we can decide how they’re going to behave on our land. I think once community members started realizing there was more to the agreement than the money, that it was about the future and our kids, they started to take a different perspective of the Hydro Agreement.” - Chief Clifford Alec Ts’kw’aylaxw
“It’s really important that everyone in our community is well informed about what these agreements are all about. I believe it’s a good agreement. It’s taken years to get there, it hasn’t been a rushed process. We’ve had lots of time to think about things and to make proper decisions about the agreements. I see that there’s hope for our community and one of the biggest bonuses for our community will be the opportunity for capacitybuilding so that all of our members will be able to participate in any new economic development.” - Chief Shelley Leech T’it’q’et
*For questions and answers, meeting summaries, information specific to each community, photos from communities, video interviews with chiefs and youth, and much more, please visit www.StatimcHydro.ca or find us on Facebook.
“I would like to see the community involved with how the money should be used. I would like to see staff assist in putting together a plan - with that plan go to the people and ask them what they think. I would like to see our community do some investments also.” - Chief Brenda Lester Samahquam