Clashes feared at Caledonia rally

Mayor worries about `hotheads' tangling while OPP prepares for `all different scenarios'

Oct. 15, 2006. 03:45 AM
JUDY STEED
The Star

Julian Fantino wasn't given much time to settle into his job.

Today, the newly appointed commissioner of the Ontario Provincial Police — and former chief of the Toronto police — faces a massive rally in Caledonia that could be explosive.

Organized by Gary McHale and his wife Christina, whose Richmond Hill-based group Caledonia Wake Up Call claims "credit" for "forcing" former OPP commissioner Gwen Boniface out of her job, today's rally is opposed by practically everyone involved in the land dispute.

A struggle over a 40-hectare housing development in Caledonia, just south of Hamilton — sparked in February by Six Nations protestors who claim the land belongs to native people — has escalated over the past few months.

From blockaded highways to fights between Caledonia residents and aboriginals, with high-powered land claims negotiators sent in — including former Ontario premier David Peterson and former federal cabinet ministers Jane Stewart and Barbara McDougall — a settlement has proved elusive.

On the eve of today's rally, Caledonia mayor Marie Trainer was worried about "hotheads" on both sides tangling and causing trouble.

Speaking on behalf of the Six Nations "reclamation group," Hazel Hill asked the provincial government to stop the rally, to avoid "a volatile situation."

David Ramsey, Ontario's minister of natural resources and aboriginal affairs, offered to sponsor an alternate rally that the McHales could hold on the lawn at Queen's Park. He promised them a stage and microphones but was rebuffed.

"Peaceful protests are part of a democratic society, but in this case we're concerned about public safety," Ramsey says. "I'm doing everything possible to lower tensions," he added, including making a request to the Haudenosaunee/Six Nations "to find an alternate location for their planned Sunday picnic."

It was in response to the McHales' so-called "March of Freedom" rally that an aboriginal picnic was organized on the Douglas Creek Estates site, located some 25 kilometres south of Hamilton.

"One action provokes a reaction," Ramsey says. "It's not helpful."

While the McHales promised to draw a crowd of 20,000, the OPP released a statement encouraging people to "not participate ... Rallies fuelled by negative emotions generally result in injuries and criminal charges."

The OPP noted "the residents of Caledonia have sacrificed a great deal to achieve this peace" — a fragile peace that is being maintained while negotiations continue among the provincial, federal and Six Nations governments.

The province bought the disputed site in the summer, and although the land is still being occupied, the situation has been peaceful for some time.

"We're preparing for all different scenarios," an OPP spokesman said from Caledonia yesterday. "I can't say how many officers we'll have (on the scene). We are prepared."

Did he expect to see Commissioner Fantino on site? "We've been told he doesn't start until Oct. 30."

Gary McHale is eager to talk to Fantino but says he has been told Fantino "is out of Toronto and probably out of Canada."

Why won't McHale back off, when Caledonia's non-native and Six Nations residents don't want him there?

"We've been at this 16 hours a day since June," says McHale, whose home-based business is developing computerized accounting systems. But he's so busy with Caledonia Wake Up Call, which he says has attracted donations of more than $6,000 from across Canada, that his business is in abeyance while he and his wife attend to their new-found mission.

"This is a protest against the Ontario government and the OPP," McHale says. "They're not doing their job. We want the OPP to enforce the Criminal Code and respect the Constitution and Charter of Rights."

He objects to "special treatment for natives by the OPP."

What McHale doesn't understand, says Ramsey, is that the native occupiers of the Douglas Estates "believe they have a right to the land and they might be correct. This piece of land is part of an outstanding land claim.

"Maybe we're 200 years late resolving it," Ramsey adds. "When the Indian Act was passed in 1924, it was imposed at gunpoint by the RCMP at Six Nations. There's not much support for the elected process, there."

However, Six Nations and Caledonia non-native residents seem united in their rejection of the McHales' interference in their community.

Jacqueline House's 70-year-old mother spent yesterday making corn soup for the native picnic. Was she worried? "A bit. We want to keep the peace."

"We need a peaceful resolution," said a long-time non-native resident who asked that her name not be used. "Gary McHale is just stirring the pot. He's not helping us. I wonder what his motives are. There's a right way and a wrong way to protest."

Said another: "He can come in and have the march and then he leaves. The rest of us have to live here. Obviously, he has mental issues. Excuse my language, but he's just another shit-disturber from out of town."