[Indigsol] Minutes from September 14th

Fri Sep 19 15:56:22 PDT 2008

Hi Everyone,

Here are the minutes from the meeting on Tuesday. Sorry I couldn't get them
out sooner.

Our Next Meeting: Tuesday, September 21, 1 Stewart. The room the first one
on the right. (David, could you send the Room Number?)

A question that arose at the meeting was whether anyone had a car that could
be used for a trip to Brantford (About a 6 hour drive) to support Six
Nations. Please reply if this is a possibility so that those who are
interested in going down can contact you.

*Agenda Items moved to next meeting*- Ottawa U. IPSMO; Follow-up for Walk
for Justice; IPSMO pamphlet

*IPSMO Meeting*

Tuesday September 14, 2008

In Attendence: Sylvia, Matt, Greg, Pei-ju, Nico, David, Alex, Graeme, Angela

*Agenda*

1) Report from Fundraisers

2) Tyendinaga

3) E-mail List

4) Brantford Land Reclaimation

5) Mission Statement and Goals

6) Followup Walk for Justice

7) IPSMO pamphlet

8) Potential guest speakers for meetings

9) Event Ideas

10) Announcements

Follow up for Walk for Justice and IPSMO pamphlet were moved to the agenda
at our next meeting.

*1) Fundraisers Report* - Both were a great success. The film was shown to
38 people and we raised $220. The Umi fundraiser was very well attended and
featured poets from Ottawa's Aboriginal Poetry Circle. The event raised
$325.

*2) Tyendinaga*:

*Background briefing*- A quarry was illegally developed on unceded land
known as the Culbertson Tract. 800 tonnes of gravel are removed from the
site each year.

The Mohawks of Tyendinaga have shut down the company by occupying the
quarry. Since then there has been an ongoing legal battle as the company
places charges on protestors such as Shawn Brant.

*Things we can do to help*

A) Fundraise: film night, guest speaker event

Peter Rosentahl is Shawn Brant's lawyer. In the past, Rosenthal visited
Ottawa to give a presentation for cinema politica- maybe we can have him
here with a video/doc as an educational and fundraising event

Potential films include- one about Ipperwash (Sylvia)

                                    - one about Algonquins of Barriere Lake-
those on the Quebec side (NFB film, David may have it)

                                    -we can also ask Rosenthal for
suggestions

                                    -There is a new one, also about Barriere
Lake that is more recent than Blockade, it comes up to 2007.

-John Trudell is an American Native activist and spoken word poet. He may
support the screening. We could host an event featuring him. National
Library and Archives is a possible venue. It will cost some money, but if we
advertise in advance, we should be able to cover it.

- We might be able to do another Green Door fundraiser. *Angela will check
into this.*

*Nico- will contact cinema politica regarding the possibility of having a
film night with Rosenthal.*

*Working group to take on Fundraising event and Speaker/Film event: Pei-ju,
Greg, Alex. They will come back next week with proposal of events *

B) Day of Action: Currently, people in Montreal are planning a Day of Action
on October 18th under the slogan "CN Rail, drop your racist lawsuit". They
are calling for actions. (This is the same day as the Anti-war
demonstrations here in Ottawa so maybe we should do it on a day before or
after that.)

We brainstormed ideas of potential actions including holding a rally or
deputation ("deputation" is defined as an event where a small group of
people to give a letter to the company- in practice it is usually a
low-level official- which states the what the group wants from the company,
it can be a media event)

*Day of Action Working Group-* Matt and Nico have formed a working group to
look into a range of possible actions. They will report back to the group
with logistics of actions.

Motion to hold two events *1) Movie night with speaker  2) Day of Action *

*Consensus with one abstention. We will hold both events.* Reason for
Abstention: we could separate Movie and Rosenthal in order to hold three
events.

Greg made a proposal to have discussion before the vote rather than after
the motion is made. We had general agreement on that process point.

C) Court Support (needed in January or February). We will discuss this again
at a later date.

3) *E-mail list*- Everyone is now on the Indigsol list. Matt applied for
list on resist. This will be better for security (hotmail is open and gmail
is owned). We can take this from the IPSMO Carleton budget - $30. (Members
of IPSMO Carleton have indicated that they would like to combine groups for
the ease of meeting. If there are specific Carleton events, separate
meetings can be held for that. *This relationship needs to be approved by
the community group members.* IPSMO Carleton has a budget of $300.)

Note- Indigsol list goes to 100 people, so don't send everyone messages that
are intended for an individual. General discussions are OK. Below is a copy
of everyone's e-mail addresses and names gathered at the first meeting. I
will have tangible copies for the next meeting so that people can keep one
to for reference.

* *

*4) **Brantford-** **Land** Reclamation* Six Nations, near Caledonia,

- Reclamation has been expanded to another site, many people have been
arrested

- They would like a permanent settler presence. There is interest from IPSMO
members to go down on weekend. Finding a vehicle is a problem. *Angela will
send out request for vehicles with the minutes*. We could possibly rent a
vehicle.

-They need financial and material support and will especially need this in
winter too

-We are unsure whether they are receiving funds from Six Nations.

-* The fundraising working group will discuss whether to have a fundraiser
for this as well, or to split proceeds with Tyendinaga*.

-We will passed around the hat for donations. *Matt delivered $200 when he
went down a few weeks ago. He has volunteered to collect and deliver money
again.*

* *

* 5) Mission statement and Goals*

-discussion on the term "cultural revitalization".

-David had concern about the questions it provokes about how we, as partly
non-Aboriginal people can accomplish this and as to what "revitalization"
means.

-Sylvia pointed out that by supporting women, the knowledge carriers of the
culture, we are also participating in cultural revitalization. Angela
mentioned that we can also support cultural revitalization through
publicizing and fundraising to support initiatives, not to take on the role
of teacher ourselves (eg: Algonquin/ Anishinabek language classes were held
last year here in Ottawa. They could have been better publicized)

-discussion on term Aboriginal and Indigenous, re: Lia's e-mail. David
explains that the current language in Canada is "Aboriginal"; if we're going
for International language than the UN's Indigenous is appropriate. Found
contents of article circulated a bit ambiguous and suspects that Aboriginal
and Indigenous might both be problematic as they are both global terms.

-*Consensus Decision: use Indigenous*

-Motion made to show Matt's statement with some edits to Aboriginal people
for their feed back.

-Positive feedback for Matt's proposed statement.

*Consensus Decision: It is not necessary to show statement. Instead we can
send out an introduction to groups while we work with them and if there are
any issues, they will let us know. We will use Matt's statement.*

Our Goals are Educational, Social, Political, Spiritual and Culural and try
to change the legal/political structure which is occurring

The goals and actions inform one another.

* *

*6) Speakers*

*-We would like to have guest speakers come to meetings for the sake of our
own education and awareness.*

-Pei-ju has heard an Aboriginal activist speak at a number of events. She
suggests that we have Eli come to speak to our group in order to exchange
experiences and learn from him. He might have suggestions about the way we
work together. We can also invite him to join.

-*Pei**-ju will invite him to speak at our next meeting.* If he can't make
it, we will invite him to the next. We might skip a week in between the next
week and have one the week after in order not to burn people out.

-*Graeme will get in touch with the Indigenous local poetry circle they may
come and share their poetry. He will also invite them to join.*

*7) Shabot Obaadijwan and Ardoch Update*

-Shabot Obaadijwan have walked out of negotiations with Ministry of Natural
Resources and Frontenac Ventures Corporation due to misleading statements
slanted towards a pro-mining situation that FVC gave to the press. As this
effects the public's perception of the situation, FVC has bargained in bad
faith.

*- David has offered to give the power point presentation of the history
behind the struggle at one of our meetings as the "speaker"*

Early November 7-9th the Outaouis Social Forum will take place

*Consensus: We want a table at the Outaouais Social Forum if it can be
staffed. *

*Angela can do it if it is a Friday night or Saturday.*

October 8th is the deadline to ask for a table.

*8) Announcements*

Tuesday, September 21th at 7pm there is a talk on Brazilian Mining and Food
Security at Ottawa U down the hall from our meeting.
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