Last Updated: Tuesday, July 10, 2007 | 10:49 AM ET
The Canadian Press - Posted CBC
Elected officials in Haldimand County say they'll march on Parliament Hill with local residents if Ottawa doesn't act soon to end numerous aboriginal land disputes in that area of southern Ontario.
Haldimand has been in the national spotlight since an aboriginal occupation of an unfinished housing subdivision on the outskirts of Caledonia erupted into a wider protest more than a year ago.
"We're the victim," Cayuga Mayor Marie Trainer said Monday during a news conference during which she called for the federal government to adopt "an accelerated process" for resolving land claims in her county.
"We're the pilot project for natives to see what they can get in occupations across the country."
Action is urgently needed because uncertainty created by unresolved land claims, especially at the Douglas Creek Estates in Caledonia, has brought economic development in the county to a "standstill," Trainer said.
Developers are reluctant to buy land and move ahead with projects for fear aboriginal protesters will shut them down, as they did recently at a Hagersville construction site, she said.
At least 12 projects, including a 55-home development in the village of York, have been held up, Trainer said.
The disputes are "grievously affecting the county's economy, and if allowed to continue much longer, will result in permanent damage because of lost opportunities," she said.
With five of six councillors standing in a semicircle behind her, Trainer called for a meeting with Prime Minister Stephen Harper, and suggested he appoint local MP and Citizenship and Immigration Minister Diane Finley as "minister responsible for Haldimand County, to ensure that claim settlements are given the highest priority."
Trainer also asked the federal government to give the county a permanent seat at talks with aboriginals.
Finley said she meets "regularly" with Haldimand council and community members to discuss the topic.
She noted that Ottawa established a new tribunal in June to fast-track smaller land claims and put $125 million "on the table" to help settle outstanding claims in Haldimand.
"I'm always happy to meet with them [council] and talk to them," Finley said from Ottawa.
27 claims outstanding
Since then, talks between aboriginal leaders, and the federal and provincial governments to resolve the dispute have been ongoing.
But there are also another 27 outstanding land claims in Haldimand.
Tensions worsened across the county this spring after aboriginal groups halted construction of a townhouse project in Hagersville and a planned Wal-Mart for Dunnville.
The disputes have been dragging on, Trainer said, in part because government officials must deal with five official aboriginal groups in the area, including the Six Nations band council and the hereditary chiefs, as well as more radical "splinter groups.
"That's our problem, the splinter groups," she said, calling for hereditary chiefs to rein in the groups of mainly young people, including the ones who carried out the protest in Hagersville.