May 20, 2021—Ha-Shilth-Sa—Page 9
Driver training offered through an Indigenous lens The new All Nations Driving Academy is working to empower First Nations to offer their own driving lessons By Melissa Renwick Local Journalism Initiative Reporter Tofino, BC - Lucy Sager grew up along the Highway of Tears in Terrace. The 725-kilometre corridor of highway in British Columbia has been the location of many missing and murdered Indigenous women (MMIW). Driven by a range of factors, including colonization, the disproportionately high number of MMIW is, in part, a result of poverty. Without a driver’s license or access to a vehicle, many First Nations are forced to hitchhike, she said. “The cost of hitchhiking can be your life,” said Sager. “And certainly, I’ve seen that.” After high school, Sager went on to work in construction but struggled to hire First Nations in the surrounding communities. “I would ask chief and council in multiple territories, ‘what is the biggest challenge for your people going to work?’” she said. “And consistently – for five years – it was driver’s licenses.” The insight prompted Sager to return to school to become a driving instructor and launch the All Nations Driving Academy, which delivers driving courses through an Indigenous lens. “I did this with the intention to support nations to have their own driving schools,” she said. “I was finding that in Indigenous communities [across B.C.] only five to 25 per cent of people have a valid driver’s license.” In coordination with Hayden Seitcher of the Tla-o-qui-aht youth warriors, Iris Frank, Tla-o-qui-aht First Nation education manager, and ICBC, Sager hosted a two-week driver training session at the Best Western Plus Tin Wis Resort in Tofino. “In community, a lot of the parents don’t have a car of their own,” said Seitcher. “So when [training] like this comes to where you are, it helps a lot … especially
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A two-week driver training session was recently hosted at the Best Western Plus Tin Wis Resort in Tofino. Mamuk, an Indigenous program run with the L [license] because it’s another through the BC Centre of Disease Conincentive to start studying.” trol, 21 participants from Ka:’yu:’k’t’h’/ Bringing services like driver training to First Nations communities helps “remove Che:k:tles7et’h’, Ahousaht, Tla-o-qui-aht, barriers” for Nuu-chah-nulth people, said Huu-ay-aht and Ucluelet First Nations received Class 7L and Class 4 Student Frank. Courses for free. If you are caught driving without a Since launching the All Nations Drivlicense in B.C., you face a fine between ing Academy over three years ago, Sager $500 and $2,000. A court may also sentence you to six months in jail. If you are has continued to mobilize her efforts by studying a doctorate in social sciences to caught driving while prohibited a second determine the impact of colonization on time, you face a similar fine and a court might sentence you up to one year in jail. driver’s licensing for Indigenous people in Canada. “If you go to jail, then you have a Research on the topic has been studied criminal record,” said Sager. “And if you in New Zealand and Australia, but never have children, your kids go into care. It’s in Canada, she said. actually super serious.” For some, their first experience in a car For many coastal communities, not only was when they were being driven away to is travelling to Port Alberni for driving residential school, explained Sager. lessons logistically difficult, it is finan“There’s a lot of trauma around the car,” cially inaccessible, said Frank. “All services don’t stop in Port Alberni,” she said. The rates of death, hospital admission she said. and injury related to motor vehicle colliThrough funding from ICBC and Chee
sions are twice as high among Indigenous populations than the general Canadian population, according to a 2013 study published in the Canadian Journal of Rural Medicine. Between 1992 and 2006, motor vehicle collisions were the leading cause of death for Indigenous children aged 1 to 4 years old. With a rate of 5.6 per 100,000, it was nearly four times higher than the rate for other B.C. children, according to the 2016 report Where the Rubber Meets the Road: Reducing the Impact of Motor Vehicle Crashes on Health and Well-being in BC. Through exposure therapy, Sager said she hopes to create positive memories for First Nations people so they feel safe in a vehicle. “I want people to feel like they’re safe to move their life forward,” she said. “There’s so many incredible stories like mothers getting reunited with their children and people who have chosen a life of sobriety because now they can be a legal, compliant driver and get a job.” Frank said she hopes the nation continues with the pilot project after debriefing with Seitcher and Sager to determine how they can improve it for Nuu-chah-nulth members going forward. Not only do the courses provide members living in Ty-Histanis or Esowista the ability to complete simple daily duties, such as checking their mail in nearby towns, it gives them another skill set to add to their resume, said Frank. “When people get a driver’s license [they’re] challenging systems,” said Sager. “We’re challenging systems of policing – like justice, corrections and health, because there’s this whole conversation around social mobility. When people start to rise, we’re disrupting how people are also kept down. And I will say it’s rocking the boat, and I think it’s rocking it in a really good way.”
COVID-19 case counts fall among First Nations in B.C. By Melissa Renwick Local Journalism Initiative Reporter Daily new counts of COVID-19 among First Nations in British Columbia continues to fall and is at its lowest level since June 2020. According to the First Nations Health Authority’s (FNHA) latest Community Situation Report, more than 83,400 First Nations people, along with nonIndigenous people living in or near First Nations communities, have received their first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine as of May 6, 2021. More than 10,900 have received their second. Mariah Charleson, Nuu-chah-nulth Tribal Council vice-president, said the decreasing case count is welcome news. “We really thank the guidance of the research that has allowed our people to be a priority,” she said. “We know that we have been hit disproportionately compared to the general population, so it’s been been really good to see [the decline.]” At least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine has been administered to 50 per cent of all status and eligible First Nations people within the province, the report stated. Out of the total 7,005 cases reported, 42.8 per cent were in or near a First Nations’ community, despite 78 per cent of
Indigenous people in British Columbia living off-reserve, according to the province. “Living in rural and remote [communities] adds to the risk,” said Charleson. “When we enter a lot of our communities, you don’t have to look very hard – there’s overcrowded housing, there’s a lack of essential services. It highlights a much broader issue of the lack of capacity within many of our First Nations communities.” While all 14 Nuu-chah-nulth nations have received their first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine, some continue to await their second. Charleson said that FNHA has confirmed they will all receive a second dose within the 16-week period recommended by the National Advisory Committee on Immunization. “But we can’t forget the amount of Nuu-chah-nulth people that live away from home,” she said. “We really urge communities to assist in ensuring that our vulnerable people, and all of our people, are able to receive their first and second doses.” With guidance from the Nuuu-chahnulth Tribal Council, the FNHA recently released a Communicable Disease Emergency Response (CDE) Planning Guide and template to help support nations develop their own CDE plan.
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Pictured is one of Ahousaht’s immunization sessions in early January, part of the province’s prioritization of remote Indigenous communities. Officer, Dr. Bonnie Henry, should com“The FNHA acknowledges the impormunities deactivate response activities, tance of community autonomy in choosoutlined the planning guide. ing strategies that work best for the comAs communities continue to keep their munity,” reads the planning guide. “The guard up, recognizing the pandemic is outbreak mitigation resource is a collection of wisdom provided by communities not yet over, Charleson said that the NTC health and nursing team have been during the COVID-19 pandemic, and helping to guide the way by sitting on this resource may prove helpful for other numerous committees, such as the rural communities when faced with a communicable disease and deciding on strategies and remote framework. “[The NTC nurses] are really putting the to best protect elders, knowledge keepers care of our people at the centre of their and community members.” work,” said Charleson. “Klecko-Klecko Only when COVID-19 restrictions to them.” are declared over by Provincial Health
