Employment & Business – Ann Ball

Employment & Business

Director Report

Ann Ball

Employment & Business Director OnTrack has been very successful with job postings and members applying to be part of the platform. We would like to continue to have our Tahltan members share this process with other Tahltans who may not be aware of the platform as it will assist them in obtaining employment. We also want to ensure that our membership knows to reach out to Lily Sembsmoen, OnTrack Specialist, at otspecialist@tahltan.org. Lily will be here to assist you through the registration process. She will also be available to help write and update your resumes. Her cell is 867-334-8340. Again, for anything pertaining to OnTrack, she will be there to assist, whether it is getting registered on OnTrack, resume writing, business registration, or being added to the OnTrack Facebook group, please reach out to her for assistance. We are using OnTrack to ensure our TCG membership has preferential hire via job postings to the OnTrack platform.

As stated, the OnTrack platform will become essential for preferential hire in the coming years so please encourage all Tahltans and associates to register at OnTrack.tahltan.org. It takes a few business days for approval and as stated, requires membership with the TCG prior to this approval. Note – you do not have to be a Status member to gain Tahltan Central Government membership as it is based on your Tahltan Ancestry! TCG membership registration can be found on our Tahltan.org website.

The Business Policy is progressing, and we are now working with a third-party accounting firm to ensure that the ideas for the policy can be implemented in a fair and inclusive manner. We must ensure that we are not just adding barriers for our Tahltan businesses instead of giving them opportunities. This is a very important policy for our Nation and we want to ensure that the process is fair and transparent, and several different options have been researched throughout this process. The TCG now has over 70 registered Tahltan businesses with 28 having been registered since February 2022.

The 2022 exploration season is underway for many of our industry partners. Most will be out of their sites by mid-October. The season started off strong and then cut back for many exploration companies due to the markets. We will be sending out our TCG statistics forms by November to all exploration companies to gather statistics on how many Tahltans were hired on each site; with that are the stats on how many Tahltan businesses were hired and, of course, their stats on Tahltan hires.

Tahltan Exploration Industry Training that was held April 25th - April 30th. This was the first time this training has occurred in Territory, and it was very successful. There were eight students in this program, and we are pleased to share that all eight of these participants obtained jobs within Tahltan Territory during the summer exploration season upon completion, and two students obtained full-time employment. We consider this a very successful program with huge added value to our Tahltan people.

Collective bargaining is continuing with the Red Chris Mine and the United Steelworkers Union. There is not much to update on yet, but it is important to make sure our Tahltan membership knows that this is going forward. The Tahltan Central Government is taking a firm stance to protect our Impact Benefits Agreement with the Red Chris Mine.

Please feel free to reach out to me any time regarding both employment and business. Help your fellow Tahltans and have them register for OnTrack to have access to preferential hire at ontrack.tahltan.org. You can send me an email at employmentdirector@tahltan.org, or phone me at 778-772-6355 for anything I am able to assist with.